Effectiveness of Residential Water Conservation Price and Nonprice Programs

Book excerpt: The purpose of this study is to build upon and extend previous water conservation research efforts of price and nonprice conservation programs on residential water demand in different urban areas of the southwestern United States. The primary research objectives are to: (1) develop residential water demand models to examine the effectiveness of price and nonprice programs; (2) develop and document a database of residential water demand in selected study ares; (3) evaluate the effectiveness of price and nonprice conservation programs using the water demand models and database developed for this study; and (4) examine the applicability of extending regional water demand relationships and results of conservation program effectiveness to other cities in the region. Specific issues examines on regional, seasonal and individual city basis include: How responsive are consumers to changes in the price of water?; are consumers responding to the average price, marginal price, or some combination of the two?; How does demand change or respond to implementation of nonprice conservation program? Is it appropriate to model and apply results on effectiveness to other cities in the region? The scope in terms of number and cross section of cities, detail of observations (monthly time periods), length of time covered and inclusion of price and nonprice programs combined with the analytical techniques used, contribute to making his one of the most comprehensive studies conducted on residential water use and the effectiveness of conservation programs. The research techniques and results of this evaluation will benefit water utilities and consumers through lower costs and more secure water supplies because of improved understanding and better planning and implementation of residential price, rate structure and nonprice conservation programs.