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Many complexities that have plagued water utilities as they attempt to rationally determine theefficacy of water conservation programs. These difficulties fall into three categories:conceptual - what do we mean by benefits and costs of conservation programs, and howdo those benefits and costs differ when viewed from different perspectives;informational - from where is a water utility to obtain valid and reliable informationto estimate the benefit and cost components; and,analytical - how should the benefit and cost information be properly compared tomake the correct decisions? What analytical tools can facilitate these comparisons?This paper provides an overview of a recent American Water Works Association ResearchFoundation sponsored study designed to address all three of these difficulties in a way thatenables water utilities of different sizes and differing levels of sophistication to better integratetheir supply-side and demand-side planning. Practical tools produced by this research include:a Water Utility Direct Avoided Cost Estimation Model - by analyzing the directcosts that utilities can avoid via demand reduction, water utilities define the benefitsproduced by WUE programs - influenced by system simulation models, this path-breakingwork distinguishes between short-run and long-run costs and permits utilitiesto consider seasonal differences in avoided costs - this model is intended to inform thedesign of more valuable WUE programs; a Benefit-Cost WUE Planning Model - this is a spreadsheet-planning tool thatquickly calculates water savings, costs, economic benefits, benefit-cost comparisons,and bill impacts for individual conservation programs - the current version of themodel also computes cumulative results for up to 10 programs; and,a Cost and Savings Compendium - this research also produced a compendium ofNorth American field studies of the costs and savings generated by WUE measures andpractices. This is a compilation of past and ongoing empirical research. Strengths andweakness of the research are noted and summaries are provided where appropriate. Includes figures.

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Edition: Vol. - No. Published: 06/01/2007 Number of Pages: 49File Size: 1 file , 900 KB