Mexico City's Water Supply Improving the Outlook for Sustainability (1995) / Chapter Skim
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6 Water Demand Management
6 Water Demand Management
Pages 53-70
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From page 53... ...
It was not the intent of this report to go beyond the collection of readily available, secondary data for purposes of a general discussion of water demand management in the MCMA. Information required for demand forecasting is outside the scope of this work.
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From page 54... ...
However, demand management strategies may be unpopular because they make transparent the actual price of water by revealing the true distribution of costs and benefits of heavily-subsidized consumption. Consequently, water rates in most metropolitan cities tend to lag well behind actual costs because local governments fear adverse political reactions.
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From page 55... ...
Urban water districts in Southern California purchase imported water at about $0.33 per cubic meter (1994 prices) , and residential rates vary from about $0.22 at the Irvine Ranch Water District, which has access to local ground water, to about $0.46 per cubic meter for the City of San Diego, which imports nearly all its water.
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From page 56... ...
Nondomestic users without meters, including industry, are charged on the basis of pipe diameter. For example, a bimonthly fee of $28 is charged for pipes no larger than 13 millimeters in diameter, and the tariff increases rapidly with increasing pipe diameter, reaching $223,078 for pipes greater than 300 millimeters in diameter (Departamento del Distrito Federal, 1992b)
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From page 57... ...
Bimonthly Consumption (cubic meters) Up to 10 from 10 to 20 from 20 to 30 from 30 to 60 from 60 to 120 from 120 to 240 from 240 to 420 from 420 to 660 from 660 to 960 Over 960 Source: Departamento del Distrito Federal.
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From page 58... ...
002 142,533 Percent of Homes by Source of Water Supply In-house On-Site Neigh- None borhood Alvaro Obregon Azcapotzalco Benito Juarez Coyoacan Cuajimalpa de Morelos 23,422 Cuauhtemoc Gustavo A Madero Iztacalco Iztapalapa Magdalena Contreras Miguel Hidalgo Milpa Alta Tlahuac Tlalpan Venustiano Carranza Xochimilco Federal District Total 1,789'l71 74.3% 24.4% 1.3% 3.1% 157,079 262,905 93,815 294,738 40,247 98,051 12,258 39,311 103,137 117,640 52,966 72.6% 76.3% 95.4% 78.7% 55.0% 91.9% 73.6% 75.4% 62.4% 59.3% 84.5% 42.2% 39.0% 66.4% 82.0% 55.0% 24.2% 22.9% 4.5% 20.8% 40.1% 7.7% 25.5% 24.2% 36.1% 38.8% 15.1% 50.8% 59.7% 30.2% 17.7% 40.1% 3.2% 0.8% 0.2% 0.6% 5.0% 0.3% 0.9% 0.4% 1.6% 1.9% 0.4% 7.0% 1.2% 3.4% 0.3% 4.9% 2.5% 0.7% 0.3% 0.6% 5.6% 0.7% 1.6% 0.7% 5.4% 3.4% 0.6% 17.1% 5.8% 13.8% 0.7% 9.1% Atizapan de Zaragoza 64,990 58.6% 25.5% 0.8% 5.9% Coacalco 32,072 89.1 % 7.0% 0.4% 2.1 % Cuautitlan 9,693 66.0% 30.0% 0.9% 2.7% Cuautitlan Izcalli 68,019 76.2% 17.5% 2.3% 2.9% Chalco 54,155 13.7% 12.9% 1.8% 69.9% Chicoloapan 10,749 27.2% 65.5% 2.0% 4.7% Chimalhuacan 44,016 21.6% 56.2% 6.3% 15.1% Ecatepec 283,413 46.8% 26.4% 1.2% 9.0% Huixquilucan 25,392 51.5% 34.8% 2.1 % 9.9% Ixtapaluca 26,460 32.6% 35.3% 3.0% 28.5% La Paz 25,226 39.3% 46.1% 2.0% 11.5% Naucalpan 159,372 57.3% 39.2% 1.1 % 1.3% Nezahualcoyotl 239,951 52.3% 43.3% 0.7% 2.3% Nicolas Ron~ero 34,732 34.2% 46.9% 1.6% 16.4% Tecamac 24,079 42.8% 44.5% 0.7% 11.3% Tlalnepantla 144,366 65.3% 30.6% 1.3% 1.8% Tultitlan 49,847 65.8% 21.5% 0.6% 11.2% State of Mexico 1,296,532 52.1% 32.8% 1.4% 8.8% MCMA 3,085,703 63.3% 27.4% 1.3% 5.5% Source: INEGI.
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From page 59... ...
Those homes without access to public water sources presumably obtain their supplies from surface water, illegal wells, or private vendors. The data reveal that while 97 percent of the homes in the Federal Distnct have some kind of access to piped water, only 74 percent have an in-house source.
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From page 60... ...
The quantity and quality of the service varied considerably, many poor residents substitute bottled water or soft drinks for drinking water instead of using piped water, an expensive, but presumably safe alternative to water supplies in which they have little confidence. Official statistics regarding the expansion of the water-supply system therefore disguise widely ,.
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From page 61... ...
There is some evidence that the payment of water bills is not rigidly enforced, and that many bills go unpaid without service cutoffs (Comision de Aguas de Distrito Federal, 1993~. Nearly all studies of other major cities in developing countries find that monthly water expenses are a larger share of income for the poor than for the wealthy (Crane, 1994, World Bank, 1992~.
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From page 62... ...
an in-house water supply, and (b) connected to sewers or with a septic system for the Federal District and the metropolitan area of the State of Mexico, and for the MCMA as a whole.
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From page 63... ...
Leaks can be detected by systematically metering the system, segment by segment, installing water meters in private houses, updating connection records, improving maintenance, and renovating aging installations. In the MCMA, aging infrastructure is aggravated by land subsidence caused by ove~pumping of ground water; the 1985 earthquake also caused considerable damage.
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From page 64... ...
Users may be charged once to cover costs of extending the water supply to their property; they may be charged once for a connection to the system. They may be charged periodic, fixed payments related to water use but not varying directly with water use (e.g., pipe diameter)
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From page 65... ...
adequate enforcement measures are applied against free-loaders. The most effective domestic water conservation programs have combined rate increases with public information campaigns that reinforce the message about the need to conserve, and with public participation to generate community support.
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From page 66... ...
Aside from equity concerns, implementation obstacles in the domestic sector include the general resistance to water tariffs by people who are not on a metered system, and the practical difficulties associated with the proper design of block tariffs and use of metering. The unpopularity of substantially higher prices for water, and more rigorous enforcement of bill collections, are themselves institutional and administrative issues, and are most difficult to resolve for the domestic sector.
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From page 67... ...
Population growth figures are often exaggerated so that particular regions can gain larger shares of the national budget's grants and subsidies for infrastructure development, such as water-supply systems, sewers, and highways. As investments flow to particular regions at the expense of others, migration to the better-serviced regions follows.
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From page 68... ...
Changing the demand patterns of water users requires the insight of economists and other social scientists who specialize in the design of economic incentives, educational programs, and other tools of persuasion. Despite the obvious relevance of social science training to implementation of water demand strategies, many utilities employ primarily engineers.
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From page 69... ...
First, conservation offices must receive the resources they need in order to be effective, including the funding necessary to attract qualified personnel, especially those from social science disciplines. Social scientists will tend to steer water policy away from command-and-control and toward demand management, provided that they are allotted sufficient status within the organization.
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From page 70... ...
In recent years, water officials in the MCMA have established goals of better water demand management and have taken important steps toward the realization of these goals. Reorganizations occurred to decentralize and better integrate functions, and rate structures have been changed; but perhaps more importantly, officials have voiced an intent to confront the urban growth that has created many of the water problems.
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