The Effectiveness of Intertemporal Water Restrictions: A Perspective from Consumer Strategy Model

Abstract Policy interventions on the water are commonly associated with restricting watering on specific days with a limited time window, yet very few existing studies focus on water conservation behavior in the context of the length of watering schedule intervals. People make decisions periodically, and their intertemporal time preferences may affect their decisions. In this study, we investigate the impact of the watering schedule interval on water use both theoretically and empirically. First, we incorporate intertemporal time preferences and subjective distortion of objective probabilities into a theoretical model that simulates the watering decision-making process. Our theoretical model shows that homeowners are more likely to postpone their irrigation as they become more impatient if the expected cost of having an over-watered lawn is relatively low. Second, we empirically test to which extent people’s water conservation behavior changes as the duration of water restrictions increase. We examine three types of watering schedules, i.e., odd-even day watering restriction, restricted hours watering, and voluntary watering restriction. The results show that longer watering schedule intervals increase irrigation frequency and even more water consumption. Yet, we also found that for people who prefer an immediate reward instead of a more valuable reward in the future, shortening the watering schedule intervals may be effective in reducing their irrigation frequency and promoting water conservation.JEL: D12, D15, Q31, Q50, R21