Water Rate Forecasting for Sustainable Development

AMOUNT: $15,000 US

PROJECT LEADERS: Dennis L. Soden and Ernesto Cervera

INSTITUTIONS: University of Texas at El Paso and El Colegio de la Frontera Norte

This project examines the pricing of water and determines how variation or changes in rate structures of water can be used to sustain the water supply of West Texas and northern Chihuahua. The impact of water pricing on individual demand (domestic usage) is an important first step in determining if water shortages and uncertainties can be managed using market strategies that can subsequently be applied to agricultural and industrial uses. Thus, this project reverses the relative pricing scheme of water that has treated water as a relatively low cost commodity and suggests that water rates can be structured to create a sustainable resource in the long run and that marginal increases can also be managed to insure the fiscal stability of water delivery infrastructure, an often overlooked criteria in sustainable resource delivery.