IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/recore/v54y2010i12p1117-1127.html

Alarming visual display monitors affecting shower end use water and energy conservation in Australian residential households

Author

Listed:
  • Willis, Rachelle M.
  • Stewart, Rodney A.
  • Panuwatwanich, Kriengsak
  • Jones, Sarah
  • Kyriakides, Andreas

Abstract

Sustainable urban water consumption has become a critical issue in Australian built environments due to the country's dry climate and increasingly variable rainfall. Residential households have the potential to conserve water, especially across discretionary end uses such as showering. The advent of high resolution smart meters and data loggers allows for the disaggregation of water flow recordings into a registry of water end use events (e.g. showers, washing machine and taps). This study firstly reports on a water consumption end use study sample of 151 households conducted in the Gold Coast, Australia, with a focus on daily per capita shower end use distributions. A sub-sample of 44 households within the greater sample was recruited for the installation of an alarming visual display monitor locked at 40L consumption for bathroom showers. All sub-sample shower end use event durations, volumes and flow rates were then analysed and compared utilising independent sample t-tests pre- and post-intervention. The installation of the shower monitor instigated a statistically significant mean reduction of 15.40L (27%) in shower event volumes. Monetary savings resulting from modelled water and energy conservation resulted in a 1.65-year payback period for the device. Furthermore, conservative modelling indicated that the citywide implementation of the device could yield 3% and 2.4% savings in total water and energy consumption, respectively. Moreover, a range of non-monetary benefits were identified, including the deferment of water and energy supply infrastructure, reduced resource inflationary pressures, and climate change mitigation, to name a few. Resource consumption awareness devices like the one evaluated in this study assist resource consumers to take ownership of their usage and individually tackle individualistic and/or society driven conservation goals, ultimately helping to reduce the ecological footprint of built environments.

Suggested Citation

  • Willis, Rachelle M. & Stewart, Rodney A. & Panuwatwanich, Kriengsak & Jones, Sarah & Kyriakides, Andreas, 2010. "Alarming visual display monitors affecting shower end use water and energy conservation in Australian residential households," Resources, Conservation & Recycling, Elsevier, vol. 54(12), pages 1117-1127.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:recore:v:54:y:2010:i:12:p:1117-1127
    DOI: 10.1016/j.resconrec.2010.03.004
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0921344910000686
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.resconrec.2010.03.004?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to

    for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Ueno, Tsuyoshi & Sano, Fuminori & Saeki, Osamu & Tsuji, Kiichiro, 2006. "Effectiveness of an energy-consumption information system on energy savings in residential houses based on monitored data," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 83(2), pages 166-183, February.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Makki, Anas A. & Stewart, Rodney A. & Beal, Cara D. & Panuwatwanich, Kriengsak, 2015. "Novel bottom-up urban water demand forecasting model: Revealing the determinants, drivers and predictors of residential indoor end-use consumption," Resources, Conservation & Recycling, Elsevier, vol. 95(C), pages 15-37.
    2. Huang, Liqiao & Long, Yin & Chen, Jundong & Yoshida, Yoshikuni, 2023. "Sustainable lifestyle: Urban household carbon footprint accounting and policy implications for lifestyle-based decarbonization," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 181(C).
    3. Gao, Hongchao & Wei, Tong & Lou, Inchio & Yang, Zhifeng & Shen, Zhenyao & Li, Yingxia, 2014. "Water saving effect on integrated water resource management," Resources, Conservation & Recycling, Elsevier, vol. 93(C), pages 50-58.
    4. Mainali, Bandita & Ngo, Huu Hao & Guo, Wenshan & Pham, Thi Thu Nga & Johnston, Archie, 2011. "Feasibility assessment of recycled water use for washing machines in Australia through SWOT analysis," Resources, Conservation & Recycling, Elsevier, vol. 56(1), pages 87-91.
    5. Lee, Mengshan & Tansel, Berrin & Balbin, Maribel, 2011. "Influence of residential water use efficiency measures on household water demand: A four year longitudinal study," Resources, Conservation & Recycling, Elsevier, vol. 56(1), pages 1-6.
    6. Gurung, Thulo Ram & Stewart, Rodney A. & Sharma, Ashok K. & Beal, Cara D., 2014. "Smart meters for enhanced water supply network modelling and infrastructure planning," Resources, Conservation & Recycling, Elsevier, vol. 90(C), pages 34-50.
    7. Koo, A Mi & Kim, Ju-Hee & Yoo, Seung-Hoon, 2022. "Household willingness to pay for a smart water metering and monitoring system: The case of South Korea," Utilities Policy, Elsevier, vol. 79(C).
    8. Liu, Ariane & Giurco, Damien & Mukheibir, Pierre, 2015. "Motivating metrics for household water-use feedback," Resources, Conservation & Recycling, Elsevier, vol. 103(C), pages 29-46.
    9. Carragher, Byron J. & Stewart, Rodney A. & Beal, Cara D., 2012. "Quantifying the influence of residential water appliance efficiency on average day diurnal demand patterns at an end use level: A precursor to optimised water service infrastructure planning," Resources, Conservation & Recycling, Elsevier, vol. 62(C), pages 81-90.
    10. Marie-Estelle Binet & Maria Garcia-Valiñas & Sara Suarez-Fernandez, 2024. "Nudges in sustainable water management practices: Implementation, key findings and research agenda," Post-Print halshs-04567861, HAL.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Penelope Buckley, 2020. "Prices, information and nudges for residential electricity conservation : A meta-analysis," Post-Print hal-02500507, HAL.
    2. Pothitou, Mary & Hanna, Richard F. & Chalvatzis, Konstantinos J., 2016. "Environmental knowledge, pro-environmental behaviour and energy savings in households: An empirical study," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 184(C), pages 1217-1229.
    3. Antonio Paone & Jean-Philippe Bacher, 2018. "The Impact of Building Occupant Behavior on Energy Efficiency and Methods to Influence It: A Review of the State of the Art," Energies, MDPI, vol. 11(4), pages 1-19, April.
    4. Azar, Elie & Menassa, Carol C., 2014. "A comprehensive framework to quantify energy savings potential from improved operations of commercial building stocks," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 67(C), pages 459-472.
    5. Salari, Mahmoud & Javid, Roxana J., 2017. "Modeling household energy expenditure in the United States," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 69(C), pages 822-832.
    6. Murtagh, Niamh & Nati, Michele & Headley, William R. & Gatersleben, Birgitta & Gluhak, Alexander & Imran, Muhammad Ali & Uzzell, David, 2013. "Individual energy use and feedback in an office setting: A field trial," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 62(C), pages 717-728.
    7. Musiliu 0. Oseni & Michael G. Poilitt & David M. Retner & Laura-Lucia Richter & Kong Chyong, 2013. "2013 EPRG Public Opinion Survey: Smart Energy Survey — Attitudes and Behaviours," Cambridge Working Papers in Economics 1352, Faculty of Economics, University of Cambridge.
    8. Chen, Victor L. & Delmas, Magali A. & Kaiser, William J. & Locke, Stephen L., 2015. "What can we learn from high-frequency appliance-level energy metering? Results from a field experiment," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 77(C), pages 164-175.
    9. Xiaowei Ma & Mei Wang & Chuandong Li, 2019. "A Summary on Research of Household Energy Consumption: A Bibliometric Analysis," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(1), pages 1-17, December.
    10. Stamatios Ntanos & Grigorios L. Kyriakopoulos & Garyfallos Arabatzis & Vasilios Palios & Miltiadis Chalikias, 2018. "Environmental Behavior of Secondary Education Students: A Case Study at Central Greece," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(5), pages 1-22, May.
    11. Chou, Chien-Cheng & Chiang, Cheng-Ting & Wu, Pai-Yu & Chu, Chun-Ping & Lin, Chia-Ying, 2017. "Spatiotemporal analysis and visualization of power consumption data integrated with building information models for energy savings," Resources, Conservation & Recycling, Elsevier, vol. 123(C), pages 219-229.
    12. Wall, Rob & Crosbie, Tracey, 2009. "Potential for reducing electricity demand for lighting in households: An exploratory socio-technical study," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 37(3), pages 1021-1031, March.
    13. Saidur, R. & Masjuki, H.H. & Jamaluddin, M.Y., 2007. "An application of energy and exergy analysis in residential sector of Malaysia," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 35(2), pages 1050-1063, February.
    14. Delmas, Magali A. & Fischlein, Miriam & Asensio, Omar I., 2013. "Information strategies and energy conservation behavior: A meta-analysis of experimental studies from 1975 to 2012," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 61(C), pages 729-739.
    15. Aydinalp Koksal, Merih & Rowlands, Ian H. & Parker, Paul, 2015. "Energy, cost, and emission end-use profiles of homes: An Ontario (Canada) case study," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 142(C), pages 303-316.
    16. Sahin, Mustafa Cagri & Aydinalp Koksal, Merih, 2014. "Standby electricity consumption and saving potentials of Turkish households," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 114(C), pages 531-538.
    17. Wakiyama, Takako & Kuramochi, Takeshi, 2017. "Scenario analysis of energy saving and CO2 emissions reduction potentials to ratchet up Japanese mitigation target in 2030 in the residential sector," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 103(C), pages 1-15.
    18. Ian H. Rowlands & Tobi Reid & Paul Parker, 2015. "Research with disaggregated electricity end‐use data in households: review and recommendations," Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews: Energy and Environment, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 4(5), pages 383-396, September.
    19. Handing Guo & Wanzhen Qiao & Jiren Liu, 2019. "Dynamic Feedback Analysis of Influencing Factors of Existing Building Energy-Saving Renovation Market Based on System Dynamics in China," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(1), pages 1-16, January.
    20. Imbulana Arachchi, Janaki & Managi, Shunsuke, 2021. "Preferences for energy sustainability: Different effects of gender on knowledge and importance," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 141(C).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:recore:v:54:y:2010:i:12:p:1117-1127. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Kai Meng (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.journals.elsevier.com/resources-conservation-and-recycling .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.