Dr. Ben Anderson's presentation discusses the implications of water consumption on climate change and offers insights into how data can be used to model and understand water practices. He highlights the challenges associated with gathering reliable data and the importance of recognizing the relationships between household practices, demographics, and water demand. The presentation concludes with suggestions for future research, including data linkage and improved calibration methods.

1. Practices by Proxy
Climate, Consumption and Water
(and troubles with data...)
Dr Ben Anderson
University of Essex
Please cite as:
Anderson, B (2012) Practices By Proxy: Climate, Consumption and Water, Paper presented at “Can Climate
Change Policies Be Fair?”, Royal Statistical Society, July 5th 2012, London
Royal Statistical Society, July 5th 2012 Workshop: Can climate change policies be fair?

2. Contents
Why?
Water 'practices'
How?
Proxies
What?
Models
Problems?
Data
Where next?
Royal Statistical Society, July 5th 2012 Workshop: Can climate change policies be fair?

3. Why: Water is (going to be) a problem
Energy problems:
The water industry currently
Carbon cost of `clean' accounts for 5 million tonnes
of carbon dioxide emissions per
water Year - almost one per cent of
UK greenhouse gas emissions.
Environment Agency 2009
Royal Statistical Society, July 5th 2012 Workshop: Can climate change policies be fair?

4. Why: Water is (going to be) a problem
Energy problems: With no
Carbon cost of `clean' 'behaviour'
change and no
water flow controls
Supply problems
Locally/regionally scarce
Climate change?
Demand problems
50% used by households
Poorly understood
Climate change? Source: DEFRA, 2011
Royal Statistical Society, July 5th 2012 Workshop: Can climate change policies be fair?

5. What do we want to know?
Practices in which water is implicated
Diversity
habituation, routine, practical consciou
tacit knowledge, tradition
Performance often neither fully cons
nor reflective
Alan Warde, 2005
Why people don’t do
what they ‘should’ - Jim Skea, 2011
Royal Statistical Society, July 5th 2012 Workshop: Can climate change policies be fair?

6. What do we want to know?
Practices in which water is implicated
Diversity
Proxies for practices?
'Traces' of water
Relationship with climate?
Mediation, adaptation
Relationship to demand?
From practices to litres
Image: Eric Shipton, 1951
Royal Statistical Society, July 5th 2012 Workshop: Can climate change policies be fair?

7. Conceptual Framework
habituation, routine,
neither conscious nor
reflective
Water demand = f(price + demographics + practices + attitudes) + error
Regulation Education
Market ?? ?? Information
Supply Persuasion
Policy levers & Interventions
Royal Statistical Society, July 5th 2012 Workshop: Can climate change policies be fair?

8. Conceptual Framework
Climate
change habituation, routine,
neither conscious nor
reflective
Water demand = f(price + demographics + practices + attitudes) + error
Regulation Education
Market ?? ?? Information
Supply Persuasion
Policy levers & Interventions
Royal Statistical Society, July 5th 2012 Workshop: Can climate change policies be fair?

9. How: Expenditures as Proxies
Ideal Proxy (LCF 2002-2010)
water (l/day) £
water/week
Demograp
hics Demograp
hics
Shampoo,soap
Fruit & Veg
detergents
Practices
£/week
Tea, coffee, Garden
juices products
Price
Price Regional
Climate/We
ather
Attitudes linked
Attitudes to survey
quarter
Royal Statistical Society, July 5th 2012 Workshop: Can climate change policies be fair?

10. How: Modelling Approach
2005 prices All 39121
households
Selection:
Metered 11119
Metered only
Separate -1387
Combined water & sewerage water &
sewerage
Seasonal models
20 £4.90
Remaining 9732
15 £4.85
10 £4.80
5 £4.75
0 £4.70
Winter (Dec – Feb) Spring (Mar – May) Summer (Jun – Aug) Autumn (Sep – Nov)
Water £/week Mean rainfall (cm) Mean number
raindays
Mean sunshine Mean temperature
hours (/10)
Royal Statistical Society, July 5th 2012 Workshop: Can climate change policies be fair?

11. What: Summary Results
Weather (3 year anomly interaction) Climate/W
Weather (contemporary interaction)
eather
Practices
Washing machine/dishwasher
Long-term illness, age of HRP, gender of HRP, ethnicity of HRP
Practices
Age distributions, number of persons
N cars, n earners, HRP employment, composition
Accommodation, number of rooms, tenure Traces of
Region, year, income Practices?
0% 5% 10% 15% 20% 25% 30%
r sq change in rsq
Linear regression (OLS), Wald Table, n = 11,192, final r sq = 27%
Royal Statistical Society, July 5th 2012 Workshop: Can climate change policies be fair?

12. What: Practice 'effects'
Traces of Practices?
Royal Statistical Society, July 5th 2012 Workshop: Can climate change policies be fair?

13. What: Weather 'interaction effects'
Proxy Spring Summer
Main effect Interaction Main effect Interaction
Leaf & stem vegetables 0.069 0.905
(unusually
hot)
Detergents/washing powder 0.066 -0.087 (number
of rain days)
plants, flowers, seeds, N/s 0.018
fertilisers, insecticides (temperature)
Royal Statistical Society, July 5th 2012 Workshop: Can climate change policies be fair?

14. So...
The 'proxies for practices' approach has value
But
Garden/soils etc
Period of water use?
Expenditures as proxies?
High spend != high volume
Recall/response 'error'?
72% reported no spend on soaps,
Zeros! shower gels etc in 2010!
What to do? A well-known problem in the analysis of
expenditures
Royal Statistical Society, July 5th 2012 Workshop: Can climate change policies be fair?

15. Approaches to 'validation'
Link 'real' data
Model response data
Look for 'odd responses' or outliers given model (residuals)
Aggregate and compare with other sources
Royal Statistical Society, July 5th 2012 Workshop: Can climate change policies be fair?

16. Linking 'water'
Practice based survey of water 'habits'
1800 respondents across South & East England
Linked metering data for survey respondents
For those who agreed to linkage
Of whom 4 are metered
And whose water company also agreed (!) who said they weren't!
Metered: 769 42% 10% didn't know
Agreed to linkage: 282 15%
To date we only have 64 records
Agreed to linkage and 132 7%
metered To date we only have 32 records
Royal Statistical Society, July 5th 2012 Workshop: Can climate change policies be fair?

17. Linking 'water': What we hope for...
Royal Statistical Society, July 5th 2012 Workshop: Can climate change policies be fair?

18. Linking 'water': What we get...
Preliminary
results with
incomplete
data, please
do not cite!
To be
refreshed
when
more data
arrives
21 metered respondents who agreed to data linkage AND estimated monthly water bill
Royal Statistical Society, July 5th 2012 Workshop: Can climate change policies be fair?

19. Aggregating 'electricity' Ia
Survey:
Total
LCF 2010
Yorkshire and the Humber
DECC
West Midlands
Wales Sub-regional
South West electricity
South East statistics
North East
(aggregated
Greater London
LSOAs)
Eastern
East Midlands
0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16 18
Mean £ per week (LCF, 2010)
Mean £ per week (DECC 2010, assume 12p per kwh)
Royal Statistical Society, July 5th 2012 Workshop: Can climate change policies be fair?

20. Aggregating 'electricity' Ib
Total
Yorkshire and the Humber
West Midlands
Wales
South West 18
South East
North East
Greater London
Eastern
Mean £ per week (DECC, 2010, assumes 12p per kwh)
East Midlands
0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16 18
16
Mean £ per week (EFS, 2010)
Mean £ per week (DECC 2010, assume 12p per kwh)
R² = 0.3642018973
14
Survey: 12
LCF 2010 10
DECC 8
Sub-regional 6
electricity 4
statistics 2
(aggregated
0
LSOAs) 7.5 8 8.5 9 9.5 10
Mean £ per week (LCF, 2010)
Royal Statistical Society, July 5th 2012 Workshop: Can climate change policies be fair?

21. Aggregating 'electricity' IIa
Ideally
Geo-referenced clusters of LCF households
Compare to DECC LSOA data
Royal Statistical Society, July 5th 2012 Workshop: Can climate change policies be fair?

22. Aggregating 'electricity' IIa
Ideally
Geo-referenced clusters of LCF households
Compare to DECC LSOA data
Not yet in Secure Data Service...
'Spatial Microsimulation'
So:
Small Area Estimation
East of England
LSOA level electricity demand estimates
New data please!
Census 2001 & LCF 2010
Compare to DECC LSOA data
Royal Statistical Society, July 5th 2012 Workshop: Can climate change policies be fair?

23. Aggregating 'electricity' IIb
LSOAs
East of England
Forest Heath 002A/B
c. 73% = Born in the
USA!
Royal Statistical Society, July 5th 2012 Workshop: Can climate change policies be fair?

24. Aggregating 'electricity' IIc
Royal Statistical Society, July 5th 2012 Workshop: Can climate change policies be fair?

25. Aggregating 'electricity' IId
Spearman rho:
Town: 0.6403
Urban: 0.5915
Village: 0.7948
Royal Statistical Society, July 5th 2012 Workshop: Can climate change policies be fair?

26. So what?
We can map:
Energy 'poverty'
Energy 'inequality'
And we can model
Potential policy effects
Royal Statistical Society, July 5th 2012 Workshop: Can climate change policies be fair?

27. So what?
We can map:
Energy 'poverty'
Energy 'inequality'
And we can model
Potential policy effects
But also
The electricity
expenditures may
be robust
Royal Statistical Society, July 5th 2012 Workshop: Can climate change policies be fair?

28. Conclusions
Thinking about expenditures as proxies for practices
Has some value
BUT there are problems
Zeros?
Mis-reporting?
Where next?
Royal Statistical Society, July 5th 2012 Workshop: Can climate change policies be fair?

29. Conclusions
Thinking about expenditures as proxies for practices
Has some value
BUT there are problems
Zeros?
Mis-reporting?
Where next?
Data linkage?
Micro and area level calibration?
Royal Statistical Society, July 5th 2012 Workshop: Can climate change policies be fair?

30. Thank you
Dr Ben Anderson
benander@essex.ac.uk
Sustainable Practices Research Group
www.sprg.ac.uk
Spatial microsimulation:
http://www.scribd.com/collections/3209973/Spatial-microsimulation
Royal Statistical Society, July 5th 2012 Workshop: Can climate change policies be fair?