- backed up by outrageous lies about reducing them by 'Beating the Meter '
Government desperate to dilute the numbers on the December 10th MarchIf you want to tell a lie, tell a big one.
1. For the original billing plan, Irish Water published the water volumes on which Assessed Bills would be issued
Note:
The original Irish Water Charges page has now been replaced by the new charging plan
The original page is available on the WayBack machine
https://web.archive.org/web/20141028170428/http://www.water.ie/customer-applications/charges/
2. Two adults with two children = 129 Cubic Metres
Look at that figure in the grid above - of 129 m3 for two adults and two children. Thats 129,000 litres.
Read http://www.irishexaminer.com/ireland/meters-will-cut-family-water-use-by-just-6-297603.html
November 13, 2014
Meters will cut family water use by just 6%
Extracts:
Irish Water has supplied details to the regulator of the estimated reduced use of water by households from metering based on a survey it did of 1,600 households, the Irish Examiner can confirm.This demonstrates that:
….
The regulator’s office last night confirmed the estimated saving of just 6% in water usage with water meters.
….
An average household of two adults and two children are expected to use 137,100 litres per year, the regulator says, which reduces to 129,000 with a meter.
3. The Assessed volumes published by Irish Water had the expected 6% ‘meter effect’ applied.
This would be sensible to do.People were promised rebates for assessed bills that turned out to be greater than those arising after some months of metered use. It is probable that many would be most conscious of saving at least for this initial period.
If large numbers of people ended up demanding rebates, this would be both very bad PR as well as an administrative load.
4. The Assessed water consumption volumes are therefore 6% below the estimate for non-metered, so the pre-meter volumes are:
5. Compare these ‘actual expected’ volumes with the numbers being touted under the new billing plan.
From a report at http://www.independent.ie/irish-news/water/irish-water-crisis/half-of-homes-will-be-able-to-beat-the-water-meter-30762095.htmlNovember 21, 2014
Extracts:
“The company estimated that one in three metered customers would receive bills below the capped rates. A reduction in consumption of 15pc, or 20 to 35 litres per day, would mean that 50pc of metered customers could reduce their bill to an amount below the cap.”
"We believe with a 15pc reduction, half the country will beat the meter”
There are two major problems with these assertions:
A. The water consumption base implied there and from which to reduce is wildly understated.
Claim: 15% = 20 or 35 litres per day, so:
“Half the country” seems to be missing.
The lowest is a single adult household at 70 m3 per year
B. The expected reduction was 6%, not 15%. Even with a 15% reduction, nobody gets down to the capped volumes.
What are the cap volumes that people have to meet and drop under before they can see a lesser Bill?‘Single adult’ cap is €160
‘Two or more adults’ cap is €260
New (lower) price per cubic metre (1000 litres) is €3.70
The cap would therefore ‘buy’ 43.24 m3 for a single adult, or 70.27 m3 for two or more adults.
Each child gets an allowance of 21 m3 per year.
The capped volumes after children’s allowances are added work out as:
The water volumes to be reduced in order to get down from pre-meter volumes to capped volumes are:
Irish Water claim that “A reduction in consumption of 15pc, or 20 to 35 litres per day, would mean that 50pc of metered customers could reduce their bill to an amount below the cap.”
But 20 to 25 litres per day is 7.3 to 12.8 m3 per year.
The lowest possible reductions to meet the cap are 22 to 27 m3
What precentage reductions are required to reduce from Pre-Meter consumption to meet Cap consumption?
Bear in mind that the 'meter effect' expected by Irish Water was 6%. That 6% was built into the original Assessed Bills.
Even if 10% to 15% reductions were possible, only a couple with 4 children (15%) or 5 children (14%) would even meet the cap.
Studies indicating 'meter effect' of 10% to 15% are looking at the initial phase immediately following the meter installation - where meter readings indicate a leak within a house. This is a one-off situation. These leaks are not 'consumption' that can be moderated by day-to-day water habits of the residents. Once any leaks are fixed, it seems that 6% becomes the general day-to-day effect of metering.
There are "Lies, damned lies, and statistics"
Then there is what Irish Water and the government come out with.
What happened?
They came out with metering and a pricing plan.
The government got really scared by the numbers on the streets protesting.
They came back with Plan.B – bills capped to €160 or €260 – with €100 to help pay the bills.
They had to try reduce the numbers marching in protest. Split the protestor pool.
- Paint (all) protests as infested with "sinister fringes" who try to provoke violence - so as to scare off "reasonable"/"respectable" people.
They needed to fool the (stupid) people even more.
So Plan.B.1
- Tell people that “half the country” (aka anyone who tried even a little) would easily be able to reduce consumption enough to get bills well under the caps.
Minister Alan ( my legacy will be a nose much longer than Pinocchio's ) Kelly:
"We estimate that if metered households can reduce their water consumption by between ten and fifteen per cent, then approximately half of Irish households will be able to ‘beat the cap’ and have bills lower than the amounts outlined. "In the Dail - where he said that - this is known as "misleading the Dail".
"In fact, some people will be able to get their bills below €100 and when taken with the water conservation grant – they will likely be slightly better off because of the introduction of water charges and meter."You really have to parse everything that politicians say.
What does "some" mean here?
It can only mean the "some people" who are never home. Single people - who shower in the gym or go smelly. They poo anywhere but home. They eat out.
*Technically*... "some people" might be able to beat the meter.
Kelly's attempts at a Pinocchio legacy are in danger of being outshadowed by Michael McNicholas of Ervia:
“According to McNicholas, around 25pc of households are already below the implied usage level in those charges and can reduce their bill easily."
Government hope that compliant media will regurgitate this nonsense without checking the numbers.
It’s extreme short-termism.
When the bills start coming, the story will be blown completely.
It seems that they have decided to worry about that when the time comes.
In the meantime, they just want as many people as possible people off the streets. It’s embarrassing for them.
Irish Water – taking the piss, in more ways than one
Addendum:
How a sample family might “Beat the meter”
Just for giggles, let’s see how a household of two adults and two children could reduce consumptionFrom 137,000 litres - Regulator agreed with Irish Water as the normal pre-metering volume
To 112,000 litres – The capped volume for that household
That’s a reduction of 25,000 litres - a percentage reduction of 18.25%
Toilet flushing is a major consumer of water.
The old standard cistern ( the bog standard ? ) flushes 6 litres
A modern dual-flush cistern flushes 4.5 or 3 litres.
Let’s work with 4.5 litres – the “number 2” of a dual-flush
Let’s say they put a displacement brick/hippo in the cistern if they have an old type – to bring water content of a flush down to 4.5 litres. ( A gallon - near as makes no difference )
This family is conservation-aware.
How many 4.5 litre flushes in a reduction of 25,000 litres?
5,556 flushes per year
15 flushes per day.
That's a LOT ( aka 'not a chance in hell' ) of water to try and save by turning off the tap while brushing teeth, etc.
Okies!
This is ….“Conservation Boot Camp”
We’re going to use rainwater flush the toilets.
If we can do 15 rainwater flushes per day over 2 adults and 2 children we can meet the cap.
That’s an average of 3.8 flushes per person per day
…which would be….. kind of all the flushes they ever do anyway.
This is ….Conservation extreme. It’s “I’m gotta colon – Get me out of here”
OK. We can’t afford to set up a separate water tank in the attic, fed by pumps from water butts and run a pipe to the cistern(s) in the bathroom(s).
We’ll use buckets of water to flush. No touching that flush lever !!!
There’s absolutely no financial gain here. It just meets the cap.
However, any further flushes avoided would be worth €0.0167 each
It’s rather a pity that there would be no flushes to save. We’ve cut 15 per day – average 3.8 each.
Maybe we were flushing 16 times a day – that’s 4 flushes each. Eat fibre. Keep regular. Also be sure to hydrate.
If we use rainwater for the 16th flush of the day, that’s 365 flushes of 4.5 litres per year.
That’s 1,643 litres under the cap – worth €6.08 per year at €3.70 per m3
Awesome. We are flushed with success.
Unfortunately, there are some practical considerations here.
16 buckets of water a day.
How many buckets can we keep handily available close to the bathroom?
How many buckets can we fit in the bathroom?
How many outside the door?
It’s not reasonable to have people (especially small children) go out to fill a bucket as part of the bathroom ritual – particularly if it’s bucketing down outside – and particularly at night.
Maybe keep 4 buckets of water indoors. One flush each. Try not to knock them over or spill much as we pour it down.
Try not to spill as we carry buckets of water around indoors and maybe up a stairs.
Oops! Floaters! More water!
Water butts – harvesting rainwater from downpipes
16 by 4.5 litre flushes per day is 72 litres.
I see plain water butts available – say €300 for a 300 litre one.
That would be good for 4 days and a bit.
With that extra 16th daily flush getting us €6.08 per year under the cap, we’d have our investment back in about 50 years.
There is a tiny problem with this picture.
The family have to stay home. They're not going to 'go' 4 times a day at home if they are out at work or school.
Maybe if they *never* have a bath? Maybe have a good wash only every second day - or so?
In any case, . that rainwater flushng part would be dependent on enough rain being harvested on a continuous basis. We’d need more capacity to cater for dry spells.
Remember that line in the movie Jaws:
Yes. We’re going to need a bigger butt.
We’re definitely going to need them for bigger households.
It’s not like we can just pull butts out of out asses. We might be looking at a 100-year payback.
Probably not that long though.
As soon as the government gets its nerve back, those caps will go. All of a sudden we’ll be looking at the original billing level for a family with two children at the €278 level.
That will be €278 and not €100 “grant” – as the “grant” is an attempt at an accounting ‘stroke’ to replace the original Household Allowance.
Bills will climb rapidly, particularly as corporations will sue under trade agreements like TISA or TTIP to be allowed compete in the market.
So investing money that we might or might not have in rain harvesting could have a payback.
But…
Only half of the bill is for water supply.
The other half is for wastewater disposal.
With enough people using rainwater to flush toilets or do various types of household cleaning that ends up in wastewater, the suppliers are going to start charging for accepting the wastewater that they didn’t get paid for as water supply.
Payback time goes way up again.
Bottom line for domestic rainwater harvesting
It's not going to reduce the bills to a significant degree.The investment for storage, piping, pumps and control systems would be high. You would be paying a lot of money simply for 'feel-good' and some independence if the public water supply were interrupted.
The sample family above - IF they normally flush 3 or 4 times a day each - only get to save €6/year if they carry buckets of water indoors for ALL flushing.
If they do not flush that many times each - because they do some/most at work/school/etc. - then each one they don't do is 1 gallon that they would have to save some other way. If they flush at home only twice each, then that's maybe 8 gallons a day that they would have to conserve some other way. And ..... that's just to meet the cap - with no reduction of the capped bill.
They can't conserve that much water - not unless they invest in equipment to purify harvested rainwater.
Dublin City Council have a page on water harvesting at http://www.dublincity.ie/main-menu-services-water-waste-and-environment-your-drinking-water-rainwater-harvesting/rainwater
Extract:
If you are a non-domestic customer you can significantly reduce your annual water bill
The average reduction in water consumption due to installation of a meter was estimated at 6% by Irish Water. They built that into the Assessed (non-metered) Bills in the original pricing plan.
Your chances of "beating the meter" - a reduction of over 18% in the case of 2 adults with 2 children - are just the wild imaginings of Government / Irish Water spin doctors.
Added - December 3rd & 9th, 2014
That Dublin City Council page linked just above was modifed heavily on December 3rd.
It had stated that rainwater harvesting systems had to be registered with Irish Water. That was the subject of a twitter storm. The registration need was deleted - amongst other changes.
In particular as related to this blog:
The new page has modified the sentence quoted above -
"If you are a non-domestic customer you can significantly reduce your annual water bill"
It now reads
"If you have a metered account you can significantly reduce your annual water bill"
A saving grace is that as part of the modifications, they added extra advice on rainwater harvesting:
More sophisticated rainwater harvesting systems are not common in Dublin for the following reasons:This should be a clear indications that "If you have a metered account you can significantly reduce your annual water bill" is missing something like "provided that you can make a significant investment in the system so that it covers water purification."
It is important to evaluate the potential savings before investing in a rainwater harvesting system.
- The relatively high cost of the systems especially if retro-fitting.
- Concerns that the quality of the water may pose a health risk.
- Requires some technical skills to install and provide regular maintenance.
Quite apart from the cost of the re-plumbing, tanks and pumps, there is also the cost of purifying that rainwater.
Rainwater is as sewerage. Birds poop in it. Vermin could possibly dump in it. It has washed your roof and gutters. It's probably been sitting in a tank for many days or weks. It's a cocktail - and a potentialy dangerous one - healthwise.
You should not drink it or brush your teeth with it.
You should not shower with it. You could end up breathing in something nasty due to the aerosol effect of a shower.
You have to keep it separate from normal kitchen and bathroom hot & cold supplies.
Without treatment, you are limited to flushing and maybe a clothes washer (but low-termperature washes might be an issue). You might use it for general house-cleaning, but you need some way of heating it.
If you used it for toilet-flushing only, you don't need a treatment system. You still need storage, pumps and retro-plumbing of the cistern supply (if this is not a new-build/refurb).
Under the revised Billing system announced in November, you are not going to see a payback that gets you under your capped bill. Even if you skip the pumps & plumbing - and carry buckets of water indoors for all flushing - you still don't get a payback.
That change from "If you are a non-domestic customer you can significantly reduce your annual water bill"
to "If you have a metered account you can significantly reduce your annual water bill".
Has to be seen as spin - even if vague caveats lurk nearby.
It's the same as saying "If you only use taxis, you can significantly reduce your annual motoring costs".
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