Municipal Water Managment and Planning

Recent population growth throughout the Southwest, together with limited opportunities to augment supply, have increased the importance of demand management as a means of adapting to climate variability and change. The Western Water Assessment turned its attention to water demand, conservation, and drought planning in the spring of 2002 when it became apparent that Colorado was entering a severe drought.  WWA research has examined the effectiveness of drought response measures enacted by several Colorado Front Range municipalities, as well as the extent of municipal drought planning since 2002 and how that planning utilizes climate information.  WWA has also compiled an extensive review of the literature that summarizes studies of both utility and non-utility controlled factors influencing demand.  These efforts are in furtherance of WWA’s mission to “identify and characterize regional vulnerabilities to climate variability and change” and “to develop information to assist water-resource decision-makers throughout the Intermountain West.”

WWA Research and Projects

South Platte Regional Assessment Tool (SPRAT)
Draining the northeast quadrant of Colorado, the South Platte River Basin covers approximately 20 percent of the state and houses roughly 70 percent of its population, including the Denver-Metro area and Front Range cities to the north. SPRAT models the movement and allocation of water throughout the Basin, allowing users to make relative comparisons of the water supply and demand impacts associated with various population growth, climate/hydrologic, and agricultural land-use scenarios, and by allowing the merits of various water management alternatives (adaptations) and infrastructure changes to be similarly compared. Researcher Chris Goemans, CSU.

Aurora Study:
Aurora Water has implemented a variety of demand management strategies in the past 4 years that collectively have produced a significant reduction in municipal water demand.  Researchers from the Western Water Assessment (WWA) in cooperation with Aurora Water are conducting an analysis of Aurora Water’s billing database over the past eight years, focusing on the residential sector which showed the highest level of response, in an effort to provide insight into water use, consumption behavior, and effectiveness of watering restrictions. Researchers Douglas Kenney, NRLC, Bobbie Klein, CSTPR, Chris Goemans, CSU, Jessica Lowrey, WWA.

2002 Drought
This site provides WWA publications addressing lessons learned from the 2002 drought as well as other information and resources. Researchers Researchers Douglas Kenney, NRLC, Bobbie Klein, CSTPR, Chris Goemans, CSU, Andrea Ray, Jessica Lowrey, WWA.

Water Rights and Climate Change Project
In many basins throughout the West, snowmelt is coming earlier than in historic times, prompting holders of prior appropriation water rights to demand water at an earlier calendar date than in the past.  This is obviously problematic for those rights defined in terms of specific calendar dates (associated with historic patterns of use), and may be even more troublesome for rights defined more generally (e.g., such as an “irrigation season” right), as this can have the net effect of increasing the diversion season and, thus, the size of the right.  This ongoing project (Summer 2007 to Summer 2008) will examine the extent to which this problem exists in Colorado and in a yet-to-be-determined Pacific Northwest state, where earlier runoff is much more pronounced than in the Rocky Mountain region. Researchers Kenney, NRLC, Klein, CSTPR, Goemans, CSU, Alvord, CIRES.

Climate Workshops for Front Range Water Managers
Climate workshops geared towards municipal, state, and federal water managers, extension specialists, other policy makers interested in climate and water resources management. Topics include long-term climate trends and projections and potential impacts to water resources in the West, as well as seasonal forecasts and outlooks. WWA has an ongoing effort to host or co-sponsor workshops with water managers to develop and maintain two-way communication on needs for climate information by this sector and climate research and products.

Other Information and Resources

AMWA: Implications of Climate Change for Urban Water Utilities, December 2007

Water Use and Residential Rate Structures in the Intermountain West (2005), published by the Utah Economic and Business Review

Water Rate Structures in Colorado: How Colorado Cities Compare in Using this Important Water Use Efficiency Tool (2004), by Western Resource Advocates

Water Conservation in the United States: A Decade of Progress (2001), by Mary Ann Dickinson, Executive Director, California Urban Water Conservation Council

Population Projections, States: 1995 to 2025 (1997), by the US Census Bureau

 

Front Range Municipal Drought Plans

Aurora (adpoted 2005)

Boulder (adopted February 20, 2003)

Colorado Springs (adopted March 25, 2003).  Chapter 12, art. 4, part 13

Denver Water (adoted May, 2004)

Erie

Longmont (adopted May 11, 2004)

Louisville (adopted March, 2004)

Thornton (adopted August 13, 2002)