The average person in the UK currently uses around 140 litres of water per day.
To help you visualise that, it′s 12 bath tubs a week or 256 water butts a year.
An average family of four will use enough water in a year to fill two double decker buses.
It′s very different in other countries - the average person in Germany uses around 121 litres of water per day.
Water is more precious now than ever before…and every drop counts.
In order to save the planet, we have to save water.
The Big Bang Partnership, together with Waterwise, is leading a sprint at NWG′s Innovation Festival this year looking at this very subject.
Their ‘Every Drop Counts′ sprint will try and come up with new and innovative ways in which the UK can start to save water and changes to water consumption can be made.
Exploring the approaches of other countries and cultures to making the most of every drop, and cutting edge techniques and technology to help recycle the water we use - the sprint team will explore every possible avenue in order to help make changes.
The ultimate goal is to reduce consumption from 140 litres per day to 110 litres by 2025.
Dr Jo North from The Big Bang Partnership said: "The Innovation Festival is the perfect place to explore new ways to engage with people about how they consume water. I′m sure that, with the techniques that I′ll share, we will get people thinking creatively about this precious resource.
"It′s all about helping people look at the issue differently in order to come up with different solutions - and that′s what′s needed here if we are to prevent serious water shortages in the future."
Waterwise Managing Director Nicci Russell, said "I′m thrilled to be working on this sprint with Northumbrian Water and Big Bang. We know that the whole of the country is likely to see longer, more frequent and more intense droughts in our lifetimes and as there are ever more of us, we need to make the water we do have go further.
"Its brilliant that Northumbrian are taking such an invigorating look at how we can be much more ambitious in wasting less water. I′m really looking forward to zooming in from different angles to help us work with customers to do this - no one customer is the same and different things get us going!"
NWG Water Efficiency Manager Tom Andrewartha said: "Saving water has always been a priority for us as a company and although we do have lots of initiatives and technology that we currently use to make the most of every drop, the innovation festival allows us to take this to a whole new level.
"We′re interested in making changes on a larger scale and getting lots of people to take action. We focus on increasing water efficiency on a whole town approach now but we want to aim bigger with whole regions, and eventually, the whole country saving more water.
"People and our relationship with water is the key. We′ll be seeing what we can do to get everyone to think more about what they use and the challenges that we′ll all face in the future if we don′t. It′s a really exciting opportunity to help change the world and I′m looking forward to getting started."
To find out what the ‘Every Drop Counts sprint team comes up with during the festival you can follow the action live on social media by following @northumbrianh2o on Twitter, following Northumbrian Water on Facebook, or by visiting www.innovationfestival.org.
#InnovationFestival2018