A Behavioral Approach to Water Conservation: Evidence from Costa Rica

Datta, Saugato; Montero, Juan Jose Miranda; Zoratto, Laura De Castro; Calvo-Gonzalez, Oscar; Darlingm, Matthew; Lorenzana, Karina

doi:10.1596/978-1-4648-1120-3_ch1

Cited by 13 publications

(22 citation statements)

References 8 publications

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“…Findings have been similar in the water demand management literature, where usage feedback is usually either mail-based (Aitken et al, 1994;Brick et al, 2018;Datta et al, 2015;Ferraro et al, 2011;Ferraro and Price, 2013;Geller et al, 1983;Kurz et al, 2005), or provided by smart water meters (Booysen et al, 2019b;Erickson et al, 2012;Fielding et al, 2013;Liu et al, 2016;Petersen et al, 2007). Mail-based usage feedback is often provided through the existing utility bill infrastructure, thus minimising intervention costs (Sønderlund et al, 2014).…”

Section: Water Usage Behaviourmentioning

confidence: 56%

“…Interestingly, they found that the effect on households that received a prosocial norm appeal dissipated within a year, but the effect on the social comparison group was still detectable five years after intervention (Bernedo et al, 2014;Ferraro et al, 2011). Similarly, Datta et al (2015) found that a neighbourhood-wide social comparison in Belén, Costa Rica, reduced water use by between 3.7% and 5.6% over two months. However, a social comparison at municipal level did not influence behaviour.…”

Section: Water Usage Behaviourmentioning

confidence: 97%

“…The time lag between using the water and getting the bill means that users experience a disconnect between water use and cost. This limits their ability to respond to water pricing and make optimal resource use decisions (Datta et al, 2015;Gaudin, 2006). They may understand the importance of resource conservation, but fail to link it to their own behaviour (Darby, 2006).…”

Section: Behavioural Insights and Water Conservation Behaviourmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Saving water at Cape Town schools by using smart metering and behavioural change

Visser¹,

Booysen²,

Berger³

et al. 2019

Preprint

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The city of Cape Town suffered a severe water crisis in 2018. At the peak of the drought in South Africa's Western Cape, a randomised control trial at 105 schools investigated the impact of two behavioural interventions to encourage responsible water usage: detailed water usage data feedback from smart meters, and an interschool competition. Interventions reduced water usage in these schools by 15 to 26%. The information feedback was found to be more effective in reducing night time water use, indicating better water usage by the staff, while the competition was found to be more effective during the day time, indicating better water usage by the pupils. The contrast highlights the way feedback was understood differently by the two groups, with different effects on their assumption of responsibility. This example from Cape Town demonstrates the effectiveness of combining smart technologies with nudges. It provides a model of water conservation interventions for sustainable cities.

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Section: Water Usage Behaviourmentioning

confidence: 56%

Section: Water Usage Behaviourmentioning

confidence: 97%

Section: Behavioural Insights and Water Conservation Behaviourmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

Saving water at Cape Town schools by using smart metering and behavioural change

Visser¹,

Booysen²,

Berger³

et al. 2019

Preprint

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“…Accurate water usage data is essential for building water demand models that can generate reliable water usage estimates to be used for planning by utilities companies (Bakker et al, 2013;Ferraro and Price, 2013;Ghiassi et al, 2008). Although past studies have utilised several data sources, for example, municipal data, they are known for being inaccurate and unreliable (Datta et al, 2015;Ferraro and Price, 2013). Another data source frequently employed is smart water meters (Fielding et al, 2012;Gurung et al, 2014;Liu et al, 2016).…”

Section: Data Collectionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…There has been a substantial amount of research dedicated to urban water demand management, which is particularly essential in developing countries as they often suffer from high rates of urbanisation. The majority of existing research on urban water demand management have focused on the residential sector, for example, demand forecasting (Adamowski et al, 2012;Bougadis et al, 2005;Donkor et al, 2012;Ghiassi et al, 2017;Ren and Li, 2016), demand modelling (Gurung et al, 2014;Jacobs and Haarhoff, 2004), general demand management (Kenney et al, 2008), and water usage management interventions (Datta et al, 2015;Dernoncourt and Lee, 2016;Fielding et al, 2012). There is limited research on the water demand in the non-residential or educational sectors despite the fact that these sectors can be high water consumers (Sánchez-Torija et al, 2017).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Fees and governance: Towards sustainability in water resources management at schools in post-apartheid South Africa

Booysen

Wijesiri

Ripunda

et al. 2019

Sustainable Cities and Society

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Water scarcity is increasingly staking a claim next to energy as a threat to the sustainability of large cities, especially in developing countries with limited resources. The recent crisis brought on by Cape Town's "Day Zero" drought created the impetus to expand on existing research on water demand management to include analysis of school usage patterns and key determinants thereof. With the effects of apartheid still visible in society and in school infrastructure coupled with the high water usage rates at schools, this paper evaluates the impact of school affluence (whether it is fee-paying or not, and self-governing or not) on water usage. We find that poor schools use substantially more water, partially because of poor maintenance, with mean water effi-ciencies of poor schools around 50% and 80% for affluent schools. Bayesian models were used to further de-termine which characteristics of a school are good proxies for the higher usage to help administrators and policy makers in the resource constrained educational environment. In addition to the obvious detrimental impact of poor maintenance, the results also point an incriminatory finger at early morning-school usage, early afternoon usage, and Saturday usage.T Abstract and references of paper accepted for publication in Sustainable Cities and Society. Published: https://doi.

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Applying social influence insights to encourage climate resilient domestic water behavior: Bridging the theory‐practice gap

Lede

Meleady

2018

WIREs Climate Change

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Water scarcity is one of the most pressing issues of our time and it is projected to increase as global demand surges and climate change limits fresh water availability. If we are to reduce water demand, it is essential that we draw on every tool in the box, including one that is underestimated and underutilized: social influence. Research from the psychological sciences demonstrates that behavior is strongly influenced by the behavior of others, and that social influence can be harnessed to develop cost-effective strategies to encourage climate resilient behavior. Far less attention has been paid to investigate water-related interventions in comparison to interventions surrounding energy. In this paper, we consider the application of three social influence strategies to encourage water conservation: social norms; social identity; and socially comparative feedback. We not only review their empirical evidence base, but also offer an example of their application in the residential sector with the aim of highlighting how theoretical insights can be translated into practice. We argue that collaborations between researchers and industry are essential if we are to maximize the potential of behavior change interventions to encourage climate resilient water behavior. This article is categorized under: Perceptions, Behavior, and Communication of Climate Change > Behavior Change and Responses K E Y W O R D S behaviour change, climate resilient behaviour, social influence, water demand management, water conservation

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A Behavioral Approach to Water Conservation: Evidence from Costa Rica

Cited by 13 publications

References 8 publications

Saving water at Cape Town schools by using smart metering and behavioural change

Saving water at Cape Town schools by using smart metering and behavioural change

Fees and governance: Towards sustainability in water resources management at schools in post-apartheid South Africa

Applying social influence insights to encourage climate resilient domestic water behavior: Bridging the theory‐practice gap

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