Water Management in 2023: Webinar Recap

Trends in the Water Industry

Recently, there has been a sizable increase in water and sewer rates and additional fixed fees. Many people have access to and track water data but do not know how to interpret it or have efficiency plans in place. To remedy this, the installation of smart meters has been pushed by both utilities and users to get the most accurate, real-time data. Other trends noticed have been the increase in both water efficiency programs and external water audits. 

It is important to remember when performing water audits, many customers are not even aware that they have a problem. Water systems typically fail to open, and instead of cutting off supply, they continue to use more and more water. If you even remotely suspect a water issue, report it immediately to not waste unnecessary money and resources!

Tips & Best Practices 

Know your fixtures: take full inventory, measurements, and action to see if your systems are utilized and optimized. It is also important to benchmark what your expected water usage and bill are expected to be, so you can gauge unexpected spikes and decreases. 

Certain projects, such as pools or cooling towers often require submetering to isolate and pinpoint leaks, which will help to accurately track consumption across an entire property. Check with a provider to see when submetering makes sense for you to utilize. 

Creating a water balance can also be useful. When going to a site, look at all of the fixtures that use water and create a visual representation. This is almost always a good starting point to easily identifying which fixtures have abnormally high and low utilization and locating potential leaks. 

Managing Water Data

It is important to build relationships within your collected data- buildings don’t consume water, humans do. The data does not take into account what type of consumption you have, and what your metric is going to be: how many individuals use each building, how many staff are on hand, and if you are all full occupancy, are all factors that need to be considered. 

Once your metric is established, whether that be a unit, individual, building, etc., create a baseline for the target average daily consumption. Then, you can see what data is acceptable and when it spikes out of control and may indicate an issue. 

Water and Sustainability Management 

Water is a key but finite resource for economic and human activities. There are no emissions associated with water, so it doesn’t get the same publicity as carbon accounting does. But there are tons of water-related risks resulting from water scarcity, floods, and water pollution, and these risks will continue to accelerate, as global water demand is projected to see a 55% increase by 2050. 

Only 32% of companies explicitly cited water as a material topic for their business, showcasing a definite gap between perception and reality. Voluntary and mandatory reporting standards are aiming to address this gap via benchmarking disclosures and required commentary on water-related risks. 

Recently, WatchWire became a booster partner of the Institute for Market Transformation (IMT), meaning that our platform will provide programmatic identification of benchmarking and building performance standard policies that apply to each building across your portfolio. WatchWire users can then assess compliance pathways, potential penalties, or potentially stranded assets. 

Next, Andy explored popular voluntary and mandatory reporting standards that typically focus on benchmarking disclosure, and required commentary on water-related risks. 

Voluntary and Mandatory Reporting Standards 

 Energy Star Portfolio Manager

ENERGY STAR Portfolio Manager manager allows buildings to track water usage. Multi-family properties that have more than 20 units are eligible for a water score, calculated by water use intensity. As one of the most active ENERGY STAR service providers in the industry, WatchWire has a bi-directional integration with Portfolio Manager. We push and pull data to and from Portfolio Manager to automate reporting and compliance!

GRESB

Water accounts for almost 12% of the total GRESB score. Explore the points breakdown below.

CDP 

When people refer to CDP, they typically refer to the climate change questionnaire. They also offer a water security questionnaire that inquires about business impacts, risks, and opportunities. 

IFRS

Water is viewed from the risk and opportunity perspective. The IFRS has recently passed and released standards that require companies to comment on the double materiality. They also provide the opportunity for regeneration and preservation that could possibly affect the entity.

• IFRS Standard1- General Requirements for Disclosure of Sustainability-Related Financial Information
  • An entity may refer to and consider the applicability of the CDSB Framework Application Guidance for Water-related Disclosures
• IFRS Standard 2- Climate-Related Disclosures
  • Climate-related risks to which the entity is exposed, which are physical and transition risks

Global Reporting Initiative

GRI and IFRS have a memorandum of understanding, committing to working together to ensure complementary, interoperable standards. Metrics that GRI asks companies to disclose include water withdrawal, water discharge, water consumption, and any minimum standards that are set for effluent discharge and how they are treated. 

SEC

The proposed SEC Climate rule would require registrants to disclose information about: 

• the registrant’s governance of climate-related risks and relevant risk management processes; 
• how any climate-related risks identified by the registrant have had or are likely to have a material impact on its business and consolidated financial statements, which may manifest over the short-, medium-, or long-term; 
• how any identified climate-related risks have affected or are likely to affect the registrant’s strategy, business model, and outlook; and 
• the impact of climate-related events (severe weather events and other natural conditions) and transition activities on the line items of a registrant’s consolidated financial statements, as well as on the financial estimates and assumptions used in the financial statements.

EU FRAG

The Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD) created 5 standards, which are known as the European Sustainability Reporting Standards (ESRS). The third standard addresses water consumption, and what is recycled or reused, as well as any material adverse impacts on marine ecosystems. 

Regardless of the acronym or company, the key water-related disclosure topics typically surround water withdrawal, discharge, consumption, acute and physical risks, and water targets as part of the broader ESG target for the firm. 

To learn more about how Water Management supports water efficiency, visit their website.