5 IDENTIFICACIÓN DE RIESGOS
5.3 RIESGOS MONTAJE
environment?
The respondents to the end-use survey (one per household) generally identified as water conservers with concern for water conserva
t
ion. Broad agreement (slightly agree, agree, strongly agree) of greater than 80% was found for statements such as:I personally think of myself as a water conserver.
I would feel guilty if I didn’t save water around the house and garden.
I feel a strong personal obligation to save water around the house and garden. I am willing to put extra effort into saving water around the house and garden. I feel regretful if I waste water.
I think that wasting water is bad.
The respondents indicated that water conservation was important in their households. Broad agreement of greater than 80% was found for statements such as:
My household is good about conserving water. Water conservation is important in our household
Members of my household think that engaging in everyday actions to save water around the house and garden is a good thing.
Members of my household engage in everyday actions to save water around the house and garden.
There is agreement amongst the members of my household that engaging in everyday actions to save water around the house is a good thing to do.
We think of ourselves as a water conserving household.
There is agreement amongst family members of my household that installing water efficient appliances around the house and garden is a good thing to do.
Members of my household think that installing water efficient appliances in the house and garden is a good thing.
Most individuals engage in everyday actions to save water in the house and garden.
The respondents showed concern for the environment in general. Broad agreement of greater than 80% was found for all questions in the general environment set. This could be to a bias due to the household selection process. This is further discussed in subsection 7.1.
A broad agreement of greater than 95% was found to the statement: Having a secure water supply is important in Adelaide.
Alternative sources to desalinated water and River Murray water were sought by the respondents as indicated by broad agreement of less than 10% to the following statements:
Now that Adelaide has a seawater desalination plant, we do not need to use other water sources.
Adelaide can afford to buy River Murray water so we do not need to use other water sources.
Does a household that perceives itself to be a water conserving household use less water than a household that does not?
Survey respondents were not specifically asked if they were a high, medium or low water users. To determine if the households considered themselves a water conserving household, the mean of how strongly they agreed with the following statements on a 7 point Likert scale was used:
We think of ourselves as a water conserving household.
Most individuals engage in everyday actions to save water in the house and garden. My household is good about conserving water.
The conservation level expressed by the respondents was compared to the mean daily indoor usage (Figure 4.9). There emerged a trend in reduced water usage, although there was no statistically significant difference between households, with a mean corresponding to agree (>=5) and households who are neutral/disagree (<5) or between those that tend toward strongly agree (>=6) and those who do not (<6).
Figure 4.9: Comparison of perceived water conservation level (PWL) versus per person daily usage 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 0 1 0 0 200 30 0
Perceived water conservation level (PWL)
M ean dai ly i n d oor us a g e ( L /p er s on/ d a y ) Trend Line Trend without PWL<3
Does a household that perceives itself as a water conserving household have water efficient appliances installed?
As shown in Table 4.19 the households that strongly identified as water conservers (agreement >=6) had a higher proportion of efficient shower heads and used significantly less water for showering per person. The reduction in water usage in the shower was in part due to a significant reduction in shower duration over the other categories and also due to reduced mean shower flow rate, although the frequency of showers was not significantly different.
The households that did not identify as water conservers (disagree/neutral agreement <5) had a higher proportion of efficient toilets, which might account for the lack of significant difference in total household water use between the water conservers and the non-water conservers. The toilet usage for the households that did not identify as water conserving was not significantly less than the identifying households, regardless of the higher proportion of efficient toilets. All other differences in use were not statistically significant.
Table 4.19: Efficient appliances for perceived water conservation levels Did not identify
as water conservers Identify as water conservers Strongly identify as water conservers Number of households 32 43 64
Proportion of efficient shower heads 0.38 0.37 0.48
Shower duration (min) 6.4* 6.1* 5.6
Mean shower flow rate (L/min) 8.8* 9.0* 7.5
Mean shower use (L/person/day) 59.5* 65.9* 41.0 Proportion of 4.5L/3L and 6L/3L Dual toilets 0.5 0.37 0.41
Mean toilet use (L/person/day) 26.8 23.3 28.6
Proportion of front loaders 0.56 0.56 0.52
Mean laundry use (L/person/day) 22.4 26.0 26.0
Mean tap use (L/person/day) 32.7 31.2 27.7
* Significant difference (p<0.05) from houses who strongly identify as water conservers Do the demographics differ for the different conservation levels?
The houses that strongly identified with water conservation were more likely to contain only occupants that were aged greater than 55, were less likely to contain children and less likely to be in the high income group (Table 4.20). The majority of the households which were occupied by adults 55+ only and the low income households identified strongly with water conservation.
Table 4.20: Proportions of demographic groups for perceived water conservation levels
Did not identify Identify Strongly identify
Number of households 32 43 64
High income (>$83,000) households 0.38 0.49 0.30
Medium income households 0.31 0.35 0.34
Low income (<$38,000) households 0.31 0.16 0.36
Households with children 0.43 0.35 0.20
4.5.1 Comparison to previous studies
The SEQ study [Beal and Stewart, 2011; Beal et al., 2011a] compared the participants’ perception of total water use with the measured water use. Beal and Stewart [2011] found a trend that participants were not able to accurately assign themselves as high, medium or low water users. The self-reporting high water users were found to have a significantly lower by person and by household daily usage than those identifying as low or medium water users. Beal and Stewart (2011) indicated the reason for the differences might be due to a lack of knowledge on the proportion of each end- use.
The self-reported low and medium water users in the SEQ study were more likely to have more efficient showerheads, likewise in the Adelaide study where the precieved water conservers had a higher proportion of efficient showers. The self-reported high water users in the SEQ study were more likely to be older, contrasting the Adelaide study where the older householders were more likely to identify as being water conservers. The self-reported high water users in the SEQ study were less likely to have children, which is similar to the Adelaide study where households with children were less likely to identify as water conservers.
4.5.2 Summary and practical implications
Households that view themselves as water conservers are: more likely to have efficient showerheads
more likely to be occupied by individuals over 55 years who are not in a high income bracket. The majority of the households which contain only householders over 55 and the households with low income identify strongly with being water conservers.
The practical implications are that:
The self-identified water conserving households already have reduced shower duration and should not be a priority for targeting to increase water conservation behaviour.
The overall use of water in self-identified water conserving households is not reduced due to a higher proportion of top loaders; and thus these households may respond to rebate schemes for more efficient washing machines.