Beacon

Nelson’s demand management approaches

Nelson City Council provides an example of a council that has adopted water metering and volumetric user charges to good effect.   With a current population of 44,900 people and steady growth, reducing the summer time peak demand was a key imperative for Nelson City Council.

• Nelson City presently manages its water supply operations in-house and per capita daily water usage figures are some of the lowest recorded figures in the country at 160l/pp/pd or roughly 400l/per household/pd. 
• The Maitai and Roding rivers will provide sufficient water to meet the City’s needs in a one in 60 year drought until beyond 2059. The Council feels that it has sufficient water of high quality to meet its reasonably foreseeable needs for the next 50–60 years. 
• Nelson City Council has used universal water metering since 1999 with a capital programme installing meters into every property. The maximum two day average in 1997/98 was 42,000m³/day, whereas the peak since universal metering has been in operation is presently less than 35,000m³/day.
• The Council is currently considering an option to invest $2m in an irrigation dam which brings an opportunity to access to roughly 14,000m³ per day of additional supply (enough for 14,000 homes) at such a time as it is required, which is unlikely to be before 2050. The price of investment does not take into account the cost of supplying infrastructure to pipe the water from the dam into residential areas. A decision on whether or not to invest is pending, however, given the adequate supply out to 2060, the City is now considering whether or not a well managed demand management programme might not provide a means to render such a further investment unnecessary
• A Long Term Water Supply working party has made a recommendation that demand management and water conservation measures are to be encouraged and is continuing to investigate viable solutions to improve the sustainability and efficiency of their existing water supply.

Results

• The installation of universal water metering and volumetric user charges has reduced peak water demand over summer by at least 37%.
• Nelson City Council believes a transition to volumetric user charges is accomplished more easily if the existing charging regime is already a uniform annual charge rather than a rates based assessment.
• Council is considering adopting demand management approaches to prevent having to invest in substantial new dam infrastructure. 

Related Documents

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  04-Jan-2008 (Report WA7060/3)

  Best Practice Water Efficiency Policy and Regulation (PDF 1.4MB)

  Maggie Lawton, Damon Birchfield, David Kettle and Chloe Trenouth

  This report is an in-depth investigation into demand management practices in New Zealand and overseas and the regulation and other policy approaches that impact on the degree of success of their uptake. Shows that water conservation technologies are readily available but our water conservation policy and regulations are lagging behind and need further development to better support the adoption of such technologies.