Water Demand Management

Due to population growth, it is unrealistic to expect total demand to greatly reduce, however per capita and per business, demand should lowered.

Inefficient use of water by all stakeholders is widely seen as increasingly negligent. Greater total consumption leads to increased abstraction levels, which has an adverse environmental impact, affecting biodiversity as well as impacting aquatic ecosystems. Water companies must provide a resilient supply to customers, and to ensure this, demand must be carefully managed both at peak events and year-round.

The government has set aspirational demand targets  for water companies and these have largely been worked on individually. However, the targets should also be considered and planned for at a national level. Combining the company level plans reveals that they are not sufficient to meet the reduction targets at a national level. We recently collaborated with a number of consultancies to address the gap between the current plans and national targets, as well as the lack of a holistic approach to demand management. We explored five key problem statements the industry must address to reduce demand. From this a number of recommendations and actions were established that give the industry an adaptive strategy. If followed, I believe this will allow the industry to achieve targets and follow an agile pathway with a cohesive approach, which should achieve greater results than multiple separate approaches.

What does the future hold

The use of smart metering will be key in the future of water efficiency and demand management. It is likely that there will be a very large increase in the number of smart metered homes and businesses over the next 15 years, with some areas likely to approach 100% penetration as soon as 2030. With this increase in hardware there will also be a vast quantity of highly granular customer data available. The exploitation of this data will be key in addressing the challenges facing the industry over the next 25 years. It is currently expected that this will be used in the modelling process, for both direct demand reductions from smart metering, along with indirect benefits. Smart metering data will also enable accurate future modelling and analysis of in-place and trial demand management options. Leveraging these datasets to realise demand management benefits will be a challenging and exciting area of work over the coming years. 

It is expected that the water industry should make use of lessons learned and innovations from other industries. This should both increase the potential benefits available and decrease uncertainty that expected benefits can be achieved. Following work done on national demand management, we are ready to make the most of smart meter programmes as early as possible and unlock the maximum benefits via collaboration in this novel area for the sector.

Improving the understanding of demand management within the UK will be essential; practical testing of management, longer term views, and innovative solutions will all need to be considered. Practical testing has been limited in the UK, and many of the quoted figures are based on international research, which could be improved upon with sample size, monitoring, and contextual changes. 

Current demand management is focused on meeting government targets, however there is a need for a long-term view on demand management, due to the inherent nature of human behavioural. A considered holistic approach will enable long lasting social changes to water usage, and this will require planning. It has been challenging and engaging to be involved with the ongoing efforts to advise pragmatic national and local strategy, making considerations for the social climate and ensuring the best outcomes.