Response of municipal water use to weather across the contiguous US
Date
2018
Authors
Opalinski, Nicole, author
Bhaskar, Aditi, advisor
Sharvelle, Sybil, committee member
Manning, Dale, committee member
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Abstract
Municipal water demand exhibits seasonal patterns in response to summer withdrawals for landscape irrigation, particularly in dry regions of the western US. Outdoor water use can account for more than half of annual household water use, and therefore is a critical aspect of urban water planning under scarcity. Water use for landscape irrigation is responsive to local weather changes and drought restriction policies and therefore is targeted by demand management programs. Previous studies estimate the impact of climatic, socio-economic, and landscape factors on residential water use, but commonly focus on a single municipality. This nationwide study identified the response of municipal water use to weather variables (i.e., temperature, precipitation, evapotranspiration) using monthly water deliveries for 230 cities in the contiguous US. Using city-level multiple regression and regional-level fixed effects models, we investigated what portion of the variability in municipal water use was explained by weather across cities, and also estimated responses to weather across seasons and climate regions. Our findings indicated that municipal water use was generally well-explained by weather, with median adjusted R2 ranging from 63 to 95% across climate regions. Weather was more predictive of water use in dry climates compared to wet, and temperature had more explanatory power than precipitation or evapotranspiration. Climate regions and seasons were found to have significantly different water use responses to weather. In regional-level models, we found that relative seasonality in water use across regions corresponds to water use responses to changes in temperature. In response to a 1⁰C change in monthly maximum temperature, municipal water use was shown to increase by 1.1 to 3.9% on average, with greater responses in cold, dry regions and during summer. Climate change and population growth amplify the importance of understanding the impact of climate on water demand in the context of urban water supply.
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Subject
water conservation
watershed management
planning
water supply
water demand