Seven core issues for water demand management under CC and uncertainty: Reflection on practice and sociological approaches
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The document discusses seven core issues regarding water demand management in the context of climate change and uncertainty, emphasizing the complexity of water-related practices across different societal levels. It explores the need for a nuanced understanding of demand that incorporates quantitative measures, technology, culture, and weather impacts, as well as the management of drought and potential maladaptive systems. Shifting focus from individual behaviors to a broader range of interventions at various scales is proposed to improve water resource management.
Seven core issues for water demand management under CC and uncertainty: Reflection on practice and sociological approaches
- 1. Seven core issues for water demand management under CC and uncertainty: Reflection on practice and sociological approaches Dr Alison L Browne Lancaster Environment Centre With Dr Will Medd (LEC) and Dr Ben Anderson (Essex)
- 2. 1. Why do some approaches to demand seem so formulaic and others so fluffy? And can these differences be resolved? • pcc=ioi.Fi.VI + pcr (Herrington, 1996) • “What emerges from this systematic investigation is a picture of a highly complex relationship with water, in which physical, sensory and cognitive experiences articulate with cultural meanings and values” (Strang, 2004, p. 3)
- 3. 2. Embracing Complexity and an Idea of DISTRIBUTED DEMAND: Different lenses see different things • A practice based lens sees water demand as distributed amongst a wide array of systems within and outside of peoples homes and daily lives. • Different levels of intervention, adaptation and change: – Micro (practices, individuals, households, technology) – Meso (streets, communities, families, decentralised systems) – Macro (systems of provision, infrastructure, societal values and images of water use)
- 4. 3. If we recognise complexity as important is there anyway we can quantify it? We want numbers! • We can try to develop proxies of practice • Datasets that reveal information about stuff related to different practices e.g., Expenditure and Food Surveys capture (in a lot more detail). – Laundry related items e.g., detergents – Personal hygiene items e.g., soaps, shampoo – Food consumption items e.g., leaf and stem veg – Drinking related items e.g., fruit juices and tea – Gardening items such e.g., seeds, flowers and plants
- 5. 0.300 0.200 0.100 0.000 -0.100 -0.200 -0.300 -0.400 Lawn mowers vegetables Tea Coffee Soap/shower gel Leaf & stem Vegetable juices Mineral/spring water Potatoes powder Plants, flowers, Detergents/washing gloves/cloths seeds Pasta Garden tools Rice Kitchen Fruit juices (incl squash) Laundry/Laundrettes 95% CI (upper) 95% CI (lower) b (coefficient) Figure 4: Effects of practice proxies on water usage (metered households), Error bars are +/- 95% confidence intervals for the estimates. Error bars straddling zero indicate non- significant effects at the 0.05% level.
- 6. 4. How will demand respond to key technological, cultural and weather changes? • Mixed methodologies e.g., – Tracking ‘stuff’ associated with water use over time to spot trends. – Time use data – Micro-component data – Engaging with ‘managers’ of distributed demand – Capturing practices and change (qual and quant) • BUT Doesn’t history show us that the ‘spontaneous and chaotic’ are probably the biggest influences to social order, technology and infrastructure development? Not planning?
- 7. 100 90 Phone/email friends Travel 80 Computer Hobbies/other 70 Going out Friends/Family at home Sport/exercise 60 Reading TV/radio % 50 shopping adult care child care 40 civic acts education 30 work housework 20 eating/drinking washing sleeping 10 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 00 :0 :0 :0 :0 :0 :0 :0 :0 :0 : 06 08 10 12 14 16 18 20 22 00 0: Time Figure 1. Time Use Surveys Source UK ONS 2005 (Ben Anderson calculations[)
- 8. 5. Managing drought as crisis (not as increasing variability under CC scenarios and conditions) • Role of crisis definition in communication • Role of crisis definition for legislation • Does this definition restrict adaptive options?
- 9. 6. Has the UK really thought about Maladaptation of Water Resources? • 5 characteristics of a maladaptive system (Barnett & O’Neill): – Increasing emissions of greenhouse gases – Disproportionally burdening the most vulnerable – Having high opportunity costs – Reducing incentives to adapt – Increasing path dependencies
- 10. 7. What would happen if we stopped thinking just about water? • Responsibilities shift from individuals (in homes, individual companies) to a range of interventions focused on a range of different actors at various scales (micro-meso-macro) • Research pushing this agenda forward: – Practice based survey: quantifying a practice based understanding of demand – Micro-econometric modeling – Trajectories of practices: Workshop on imagining future trajectories of sites of demand – Interviews on practice based change during and after metering of households – Broader ARCC-Water project: agricultural demand, licensing, institutional and legislative change etc