In order to achieve these savings throughout the year though, you have to reduce your water use during your wastewater averaging period. For citizens of Austin this means that they can actually get 3 times more savings by conserving wastewater than they do by conserving potable water. gallons of wastewater used in the 0 to 2000 gallon cohort. gallons of potable water used in the 0 to 2000 gallon cohort while they charge $3. Currently, the City of Austin charges $1. Due to the nature of wastewater, you can imagine it would be more expensive to treat before being released back into environment. Generally, the cost of wastewater is higher than the cost of potable water. Conversely, if you use less water during a month than your wastewater average, then your wastewater charge should equal only the actual amount of water used that month. Therefore, you are not charged for this water usage on your wastewater bill. If you use more water than your wastewater average, then it is assumed that this additional water has been used outdoors and will not be returned back to the city’s sewers for processing and treatment. From these 3 months, the City of Austin will average the water meter readings and this will become the monthly wastewater charge for all of the other months during the year. For example, the City of Austin uses the water use from 3 consecutive monthly billing cycles between mid-November to mid-March.
This averaging is more fair just in case you have a higher water use during a single month. Typically, a multiple month average during the late fall and winter months is used rather than picking one month during the year. Therefore, the wastewater averaging period typically happens during the winter months when there should be little to no outdoor water use. The water you sprinkle on your lawn doesn’t go to the city sewers. Well, in the winter time, it generally does, but during the rest of the year, it doesn’t since you could be using water outdoors. Shouldn’t water flow IN be equal to water flow OUT? Therefore, the next best way to measure the wastewater discharge is to use your water meter to measure your monthly water use and then estimate the amount of wastewater that could be returning to the city sewers. It is not easy to measure gravity water flow through a pipe. Potable water coming into your house is measured with a water meter since the water is pressurized, but wastewater flows out of your home by gravity. Your water utility uses a wastewater average because they can’t measure the actual amount of wastewater discharged from your home. Some utilities don’t want to mess with all these calculations, so they charge a flat, monthly wastewater fee. This practice goes by a variety of names including average winter consumption, wastewater winter averaging, winter averaging, winter quarterly average, or winter period average.Ĭheck with your local utility company to see how they handle your wastewater charges. It is essentially a cap on the volume of wastewater you will be billed for each month for the next year. Wastewater averaging is the practice of estimating the amount of wastewater discharged from your home into the city’s sanitary sewer system. Wastewater averaging… ah, a favorite topic of any cocktail party! What is that… you’ve never heard of wastewater averaging? Well, sit right back and let me tell how you can hack your wastewater averaging period and save money the rest of the year. It’s tough to accurately measure gravity flow through a pipe
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