Household characteristics that influence household water use in the Hunter Region

Abstract

Up to 3 years of monthly per capita water use data (both indoor and outdoor) for 225 houses from the Hunter Region in NSW was analysed in this preliminary study. The consumption figures were found to be broadly consistent with recent Australian and New Zealand studies. The distributions of indoor and outdoor water use were highly skewed, with the highest 20% of water users consuming 30% of mains water and over 50% of outdoor water. The water use data was then stratified by various available household characteristics. Weather-related factors (eg. increasing temperature and decreasing rainfall) increased outdoor water use. The biggest intervention factor was plumbing of a rainwater tank into the toilet or laundry with indoor savings of 50-75 L/capita/day, while rainwater tanks did not significantly affect outdoor water use. Front- versus top-loading washing machines save 40 L/capita/day. Presence of an irrigation system or a swimming pool led to a non-significant increase in outdoor water. Observed water savings achieved with rainwater tanks were found to be broadly consistent with recent Australian prediction studies, although the comparison was limited by lack of household characteristics. This highlights the need for detailed household information collection to enable both proper analysis and comparison to model predictions.