Urban water usage in the United States spikes in the summer, with Americans watering their lawns to ensure their property values. Despite growing awareness of the importance of conservation, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency reports that as much as 50% of water is used for lawn and landscape irrigation. Sadly, a good portion of this potable water is wasted due to broken lines, misdirected sprinklers, and leaks. Water availability is becoming more of an issue, particularly in the Southwest, with residents concerned about individual states’ ability to meet future needs. So how do you intervene and change that behavior of water usage?
In a new study, “Building Resilience into the Public Water Supply System through Targeted Data-Driven Conservation Strategies” for the Journal of Irrigation and Drainage Engineering, authors C. Prakash Khedun, Alan C. Lewis, and Ronald A. Kaiser report to what extent educational water conservation interventions were effective in reducing water demand and waste. Looking at the period 2008–2018 (with one year being the worst drought on record in Texas), the team pulled data on 15,000 single family residences from College Station, Texas. Even during the drought year, water restrictions were not implemented (but several educational interventions were used throughout the study period), which enabled a comparison of unmitigated behavior before, during, and after the drought. Learn more about this study and how it can help other cities or municipalities grappling with demand management at https://doi.org/10.1061/JIDEDH.IRENG-10453. The abstract is below.
Abstract
Waste at the household level is an unwarranted strain on water supply systems, particularly during droughts. Conservation measures enhance resilience. Some advocate for price as an efficient instrument for encouraging conservation, whereas others contend that residential water demand is price inelastic, and mandates and education campaigns can be more effective. Consumers too are concerned that future droughts may curtail water availability and are in favor of voluntary water conservation campaigns. Here we show how education alone, without any pricing or legal interventions, can help utilities achieve substantial savings. We focus on the impacts that a set of educational interventions had on about 15,000 single family residences (SFRs) in College Station, Texas for the period 2008 to 2018. The study period includes one of the worst one-year drought on record. We first compare consumption patterns before, during, and after the drought to establish a baseline consumption, and then analyze the impacts of educational interventions that were implemented as a response to the drought. We compute the landscape irrigation budget for each SFR to determine if they are wasting water. We found that winter consumption—representative of indoor use—did not change drastically, whereas summer consumption was significantly influenced by weather. We show, by mining water use data, that consumption patterns and trends were influenced by both the drought and the educational interventions. Notably, the interventions contributed to a reduction in supply, despite an increase in the number of SFRs. Furthermore, through clustering, we identified and profiled the largest water wasters that should be prioritized to enhance conservation. We therefore suggest that a policy approach involving both mandatory and voluntary educational conservation programs may prove to be most efficacious in reducing outdoor water use and waste.
Learn more about the College Station example and how it could apply to your community in the ASCE Library: https://doi.org/10.1061/JIDEDH.IRENG-10453.
