HomeMy WebLinkAboutHandout - Comments on 2009 Modifications to Drought Response Plan
lle(}rco comments on Drought Response and Water Budgets, Agenda Item 8 April 20, 2009
Comments on 2009 Modifications to Drought Response
Plan 4/20/09
In response to the agenda memo prepared by Staff for the April 20, 2009 meeting of
WRAB on Modifications to the water budgets in response to droughts please consider the
following advice and recommendations.
1. The memo is too focused on how these changes are going to be made by Staff
with varying amounts of input from WRAB. This sets up precisely the kind of
top-down system we are trying to avoid. It is essential that the entire community
accepts how the water budget system incorporates drought response. Trying to
impose changes that many may feel are arbitrary or ill-advised will just invite
controversy and failure.
2. In the description of the goals of the update please consider the following
suggestions:
a. Rather than categorically stating that the four goals listed in the memo
"will be used in the overall update", make these suggested goals for
consideration by the WRAB and Council. This is another example of the
overly prescriptive nature of the memo.
b. The response plan needs to include input from the public and Council
prior to submission of the final recommendations this summer.
c. Goal one talks about percent reductions needed to insure system
reliability. Percent reductions only make sense in the context of what the
actual baseline demands were when the analysis was done. We should be
thinking in terms of volumes of demand reduction; not just percentages.
i. Using the year 2007 as a baseline, when the annual demand' in the
system was 5.6 Mkgal : an 8% reduction in annual water use
equates to 0.45 Mkgal, a 14% reduction is 0.78 Mkgal; 22% is 1.23
Mkgal; and 40% is 2.24 Mkgal of reduction. Thinking about the
volumes of required savings will help us design how best to
structure the drought response. (See Table 1).
d. Goal two should be re-phrased to be consistent and clear. The terms
"water budget reductions" and "water use restrictions" are redundant.
Talking about them as if they were two different things is confusing.
Reducing water budgets is a restriction on use. If by "water use
restrictions" you really mean enforcement by police patrols or mandatory
time of restrictions, say that, but that discussion should be in a separate
section on enforcement. Also, the goal should be to use water budgets as
the primary method of enforcing use restrictions, with police measures as
a back-up.
I These are treated water deliveries to customers from the billed consumption reports prepared by staff. It
may also be possible to obtain savings through reductions in un-billed water use (flushing, leaks,
unauthorized withdrawls, etc.)
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Deoreo comments on Drought Response and Water Budgets, Agenda Item 8 April 20, 2009
Table 1: Drou ht trig ers and coresponding billed deliver reduction Or gets
Drought: 0: None 1: Moderate 2: Serious 3:Severe 4:Extreme
Annual % 0% 8% 14% 22% 40%
Reduction
Target
Million Kgal 5.6 5.15 4.82 4.34 3.36
Delivery
Target
M Kgal 0 0.45 0.78 1.23 2.24
Delivery
Reduction
e. Goal three says that reductions will focus on non-essential uses, and the
response plan lists savings only for the irrigation season. Does that mean
that staff is suggesting that all non-irrigation season use is essential? It
makes more sense to look reductions over the entire year, and to explicitly
include reductions in non-irrigation use as part of the long term program.
3. The tools section:
a. Reducing water budgets is the first tool listed. What about using
techniques to eliminate excess use first, and then reducing budgets. For
example, in Table 2 we see that in 2007, 14% of the total bill deliveries in
the system was over the budgets. Why not try to eliminate this use before
reducing budgets? (Notice that this is one of the first steps taken in the
IRWD system.)
Table 2: Billed consumption report showing volumes used in each block by customer cafe oriel
Water Gonsum tion t1 Block and Customer Gate o
(k ai Jan-Dec 2007
5F MF Cl Irn Total % of Total
Acts 22300 2500 2100 1600 28500
Blk1 1,689,125 862,182 875,678 285,123 3,712,108 66%
Bik 2 337.393 243,896 369.312 119,132 1.069.733 19%
Bik 3 136,499 85,401 151.873 89,721 463.494 8%
Blk4 33.453 23,483 41,647 45.699 144,262 3%
Blk 5 30,616 18,008 55.981 88,174 192,779 3%
Total 2,227,086 1,232,970 1,494,491 627,849 5.582,396
% of Total 39.9% 22.1%1 26.8% 11.2% 100.0%
b. The use of water meter monitors was not listed as a tool for managing
water use in droughts. The Aurora stud y2 showed that customers with
these devices used them to stay within their budgets. If we are actually
going to rely on water budgets to manage water use we need to make these
monitors available to every customer.
c. Use of mandatory water restrictions in addition to water budgets is
confusing and sure to provoke hard feelings. If we are already reducing
2 Douglas Kenney, et al. Residential Water Demand Management: Lessons from Aurora Colorado. Journal
of the Americal Water Resources Association, February 2008.
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Deoreo comments on Drought Response and Water Budgets, Agenda Item 9 April 20, 2009
v
budgets we should seek to provide maximum flexibility on how and when
the customers use their water (as long as they stay within their budgets.)
Why not say that as long as the demand reductions are being met there
will be no restrictions on the day or time of use, except for normal
restrictions on irrigation during the middle of the day.
d. The use of drought sur-charges should be emphasize more strongly as a
tool for managing water use and enforcing restrictions.
i. In designing sur-charges the policy should be to keep water use
within the budgets charged at the actual cost of service, but to
inversely increase the rates to stabilize the revenues. Any time the
budgets are decreased the rates need to be increased.
ii. Charges for block 3, which is intended to represent the avoided
cost of new firm supply should be increased to account for what
new water would cost in a drought. The size of block three might
also be decreased.
iii. Costs for the two penalty blocks, 4 and 5, need to be increased to
the extent that customers will have a strong aversion to paying at
these rates.
iv. Income generated from blocks 4 and 5 was intended to pay for
conservation. This amounted to over $ 3.5 million in 2007. These
funds could help pay for the upgrades to the AMR system and the
monitors.
e. The water billing system should be included as a key tool for use
restrictions since every customer that exceeds its budget can be tagged.
Customers in the top tiers can be contacted and offered assistance.
f. Use of efficiency standards ties into integration of the drought response
and long term conservation program. Any permanent savings that
customers achieve in non-drought years will carry over into drought years.
For example, if everyone knows that in drought times the indoor budgets
will be based on high efficiency fixtures and appliances this will
encourage people to adopt those technologies prior to the drought.
4. Other:
a. Need to use billed consumption reports in conjunction with water budgets
to target use restrictions.
b. There is no sense getting too wrapped up in the ICI budgets until we finish
the ICI benchmarking study.
c. Need more public involvements
d. Return to WRAB with next draft well before a final version is prepared.
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