AWWA SOURCES59210

In December of 2002, the California Urban Water Conservation Council published a research report on "Free Riders in Ultra-Low Flow Toilet Programs." The report outlined the findings of a study that examined four different toilet replacement programs conducted by California water utility agencies. "Free riders" are defined as program participants who, without the water agency's ULFT program, would nonetheless still have replaced their toilets. Since water agencies do not get the incremental conservation benefits from serving free riders, it became important to try to identify the bounds of the free ridership phenomenon. The California Urban Water Conservation Council undertook this study with the partial support of the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation to try to put some perspective on the problem. The study was conducted using telephone surveys, canvassing both single and multi-family households that had participated in one of the four ULFT replacement programs. The results that were compiled were surprising: in these four different programs, the rates varied tremendously - from 17% to a whopping 62%. The reasons for the spread are the subject of this paper. It is clear that ULFT program design is a driving factor in reducing free ridership. This paper explores the different factors that led to the high and low free ridership rates, and offers specific advice to water utilities designing conservation programs to help them minimize the impact. Includes tables, figures.