| The goal of this research is to study the water conservation capabilities of Southern California water agencies and the institutional responses that could enhance the regional system's water conservation capacity. Southern California water conservation capabilities are going to be tested by the forecasted population growth, by the increasing demand of water for environmental purposes and by climate change that will increase the uncertainty about the future consistency of water supply. The growth of Southern California in the last century has been based on the premise of abundant water supply, whose consistency has been provided by a complex institutional arrangement. In recent year, aware of its future challenges, the system has enacted conservation policies. It is interesting to test the system's conservation effectiveness and to understand whether it needs to change in order to improve its performance in terms of water conservation. The research highlights that the Southern California water conservation effort is small in terms of resources and effective only in case of emergency. Pricing strategies have been put in place only after an emergency for drought has been declared, in response of the decline of agencies' revenues, and the per capita amount of rebates is too small to be significant. Only water conservation ordinances, changes in precipitations and changes local economic indicators are correlated with changes in per capita water usage. |
