The increased reliance on demand-side management policies as an urban water consumption management tool has stimulated considerable debate among economists, water utility managers, regulators, consumer interest groups and policymakers. In turn, this has fostered an increasing volume of literature aimed at providing best-practice estimates of price and income elasticities, quantifying the impact of non-price water restrictions and gauging the impact of non-discretionary environmental factors affecting residential water demand. This paper provides a synoptic survey of empirical residential water demand analyses conducted in the last 25 years. Both model specification and estimation and the outcomes of the analyses are discussed.

No abstract