The WaterSmart voluntary behaviour change program delivered South East Water’s service area was designed to complement initiatives in the ‘Next Stage of the Government’s Water Plan’. It used an innovative relationship-building approach, interacting with households throughout Melbourne.

The voluntary behaviour change approach was based on the philosophy of ‘helping people to help themselves’ and had a facilitated conversation as its core – encouraging people to think about their own water needs and problems and finding ways to solve them.

The approach was a long term relationship with households characterised by:

• up to four phone conversations from the WaterSmart team to each household
• the opportunity for participants to contact the team by phone, email or mail at any time over the period
• the opportunity for participants to contribute to and to read a periodic newsletter that was published eight times during the program
• The approach used voluntary behaviour change (helping people to help themselves) as its underlying principle. It was based on a conversation which was designed to focus on people’s water needs as they articulated them. The key question asked people about ‘changes they wanted to make (to water use) but hadn’t got around to’
• The approach began and concluded with a survey which gave an understanding of people’s appliances and fixtures as well as their reported behaviour in relation to water use. There was a focus on both measuring and understanding reported behaviour change over the period of the program, as well as changes in use of water
• The approach had a focus on building changes over time – encouraging people to think (e.g. ‘now I’ve started mulching, what’s this about grey water?’)
• The approach was personal, but also designed to respect privacy of all individuals
• There was a deliberate attempt to learn from WaterSmart for future programs (both on the side of implementation and program management)

Purpose

The purpose of the program was essentially three-fold:

• To bring about change in participants’ behaviour and use of water
• To understand the needs of participants as articulated in the conversations
• To learn about benefits of the approach, consider the difficulties, and recommend changes for future programs.

The method

The process was a year-long interaction with households and is summarised below:

To introduce the program, a household received a letter, and then had a phone conversation with a WaterSmart conversationalist. The first part of the phone call was a survey that gained data about the household and at the same time got people thinking about their water use in the home and garden. During the ensuing conversation, the person on the phone articulated a problem (something they wanted to change) and discussed how getting information (or tools as they were termed by the WaterSmart team) could be used to address the problem. As expected, some households chose not to participate in the program for a wide variety of reasons.

At three month intervals participants were again called to discuss the water efficiency changes they may have made and to see if they needed more assistance or materials. They could call the WaterSmart office at any time, and anyone who wanted to could receive or contribute to a newsletter via email over that time. Many households also chose to have information sent to them on the results of the program. Some households did withdraw from the program in the follow-up calls, often because they were no longer interested in being part of WaterSmart.

During the interaction period (June 2008 until October 2009) there were external factors that influenced community water use ranging from television and poster campaigns, the Target 155 initiative, and the effects of the February 2009 bushfires.

To monitor and measure the influences of these events, this project included the selection of a Control Group of households. This meant that when results of water use were calculated, any changes that were due to external factors could be factored into change by using the data from the Control group.

The changes

Those people who had been involved in the program for the 12 month period, and who had had conversations and further interactions over time, reported significant changes that they made to the efficiency of their appliances and fixtures as well as to their behaviour. Changes to household water use, based on meter readings, were also measured and reported throughout the interaction period.

People changed appliances and fixtures

In South East Water’s service area, over 8000 households participated in the WaterSmart Program. Of these, 78% of participants said the program helped them save water

By the end of the program:

• 52% had installed a water-saving showerhead
• 52% said they used a shower timer or timed themselves in the shower
• 16% had installed water flow restrictors

People reduced water use

Overall, average water consumption reduced since the beginning of the program.

Further analysis of water use in the Target and Control Groups will be conducted after summer and when participants have had a chance to implement further changes.

Different people changed in different ways

The program showed that different people changed in different ways and some wanted a longer engagement with the program than others.

The program also showed a greater propensity for the smaller households to have made larger reductions in water usage than larger households after the WaterSmart program.

Changes were embedded in people’s lives

During informal gatherings of participants, people reported telling others in their community of the changes they had made and encouraging them to do likewise.

The implementation of a voluntary behaviour change based WaterSmart program has occurred at a time when many effects have occurred simultaneously:

• Water supplies are low, combined with a continuing reduction in rainfall
• There continues to be a need to focus on at least some additional water supply options
• Governments and water corporations have recognised the need for addressing ‘demand’ not only by focussing on appliances but also on people’s behaviour
• People are asking for assistance to make changes
• The WaterSmart program has not only met this need but has suggested ways forward. The program has shown that:
  • Changes to both the uptake of appliances and behaviour have occurred using the voluntary behaviour change, relationship building approach
  • Retrofitting programs can still be part of the approach to reducing water consumption – the two programs are complementary, not mutually exclusive
  • The behaviour change method built a relationship and encouraged people to think for themselves in regards to water as evidenced by the growing ‘maturity’ of their requests during follow-up calls
  • The approach encouraged change in areas other than water, suggesting that it can be a building block for a broader based approach to living smarter, not just using water smarter
  • There was a high level of satisfaction with the program, suggesting that people in the community think more highly of the water corporations for their role in assisting them to make changes they wanted to make

Finally, and most importantly, lessons have been learnt and documented to support further development of water conservation programs for the future.