Liverpool City Council has developed a draft Community Water Conservation Strategy to assist residents to reduce their demand on tap water. This follows Liverpool’s Water Conservation Action Plan, which is being implemented to reduce Council’s own water consumption.
The draft Community Water Conservation Strategy aims to:
- support and promote a water efficient community that is proud to save water
- increase community knowledge of water efficient technologies and actions to reduce water use
- increase community ability to implement water efficient technologies and actions
- remove barriers to water saving behaviours for residents.
Records show the top water use sector in the Liverpool Local Government area is residential (units and houses), consuming 75 per cent of water supplied to the area. In 2004/05, Liverpool residents consumed an average of 260 kilolitres of water per house and 173 kilolitres of water per unit.
Sydney Water reported that by complying with water restrictions, the Liverpool community reduced the average water consumption per property from 102 kilolitres to 73 kilolitres from January and March 2003 to January to March 2004. This is approximately a 28 per cent reduction in water consumption.
Council’s Manager Sustainable Environment and Health, Arvind Lal, said that a recent survey of Liverpool residents identified that almost every household in Liverpool participates in at least one form of water conservation practice, compared with only half of the general Australian community.
“This is a fantastic result,” he said. “Water is an extremely precious resource and given Australia’s dry climate, it is important that further steps are taken to reduce water consumption.”
The strategy followed extensive community consultation, which highlighted that cost, time and lack of knowledge were the main barriers to residents conserving water. It was also identified that through additional information, incentives or rebates residents would be likely to reduce their water consumption.
Based on findings from the community consultation, Council has developed an action plan targeting behavioural and infrastructure changes. This includes:
- encouraging and promoting saving water in backyards
- providing information on water conservation and key water saving techniques
- encouraging and promoting water efficiency in rental properties
- investigating incentive and rebate schemes aimed at water efficient devices
- encouraging and promoting water conservation in unit blocks
- continuing to work with the community in implementing the water restrictions.
The action plan will be updated annually and the Community Water Conservation Strategy will be reviewed in 2008/09.
