Impacts of demand controls on municipal residential water demand

This thesis study investigates the influence of demand controls on residential water demand of customers in the Brookings Municipal Utilities water distribution system. The daily water production records from the Brookings Water Treatment Plant along with the monthly residential customer billing records are used to find trends in residential water demand as well as the impacts of new residential customers on water demand. Trends in summer residential water demand show that new customers are demanding more water than older customers during the summer while trends in winter residential water demand show that new customers are demanding less water then older customers during the winter.;Brookings Municipal Utilities currently uses two demand controls during the summer months to manage the peak summer water demand, a block rate structure called a Summer Peak Usage Adjustment Level (SPUAL) rate and an alternate day watering schedule. The effectiveness of the demand controls on residential water demand is analyzed in this thesis. The data indicate the SPUAL rate has decreased the residential demand during the summer months while the alternate day watering schedule has caused the peak day of the week to occur on Sunday but also has spread out the demand to all of the days of the week during dry periods.;To see the impact of demand controls on future water use, residential water demand predictions were made to the year 2025. The average daily residential water demand is expected to more then double from 2006 to 2025 and the peak daily residential water demand is expected to require over half of the current water treatment plant capacity. Assuming that the current demands in water use continue, the SPUAL rate demand controls would reduce the peak daily residential water demand by 46 percent.