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Introduction

The behavioural model

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provides simulation of water use using the Behavioural End-use Stochastic

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Simulator (BESS) of Thyer et al. (2011)

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, described further in the Urban Developer Plugin SRG

For indoor water uses, the water use simulations for each household are based on the type of water-using appliance (end-use) and the

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occupancy of that household. The difference from the average daily model applied in the Average Water Use node is that instead of specifying an average daily volume and percentages for each end-use, the user specifies the water-using appliance and household occupancy and BESS simulates the water for each individual end-use using the in-built parameters for the water use event dynamics.

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The appliances and occupancy for each household can be specified in two different ways:

  • Fixed occupancy and appliances – where the type of appliances and occupancy for each house are fixed by the user and
  • Sampled appliances and occupancy – where the users inputs probability distributions for the occupancy and water-using appliance. At the start of Urban Developer run the occupancy and appliance type is randomly sampled for each house in the water use nodes that are set to Behavioural. Further details on these two different configurations are given in Behavioural model configuration.
  • Average occupancy and appliances –  calculates the mean for the end use instead of calculating the demand per minute (based on events) for each end use, as in the fixed and sampled occupancy methods. These values can simply multiplied for each house (as they will all have the same average).

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By default, BESS uses a sub-daily diurnal pattern based on Roberts et al. (2005) to vary the probability of water use events occurring throughout the day. 

For outdoor water use, the behavioural model uses a time series or monthly varying pattern of average daily values, which can be input by the user - similar to the average daily model. For

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sub-daily outdoor water use,

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daily values are evenly distributed throughout the day.

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Diurnal Pattern

The statistical distributions used by BESS to generate the sub-daily indoor water use are based on the end-use study of Roberts et al. (2005). Users are encouraged to check that the predicted water use statistics provided by BESS match their expectations. BESS uses a diurnal variation to vary the probability of water use events occurring throughout the day. It disaggregates the daily demand data to a sub-daily time-step using a non-dimensionalised diurnal pattern.

Dimensionless Diurnal Pattern Weighting Configuration

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Appliance and Occupancy Type Editor

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Fixed Behavioural

Sampled Behavioural

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The Behavioural Water Use node allows the user to specify a unique combination of end-uses which will be applied to one or more houses. In this way the node can become a template representing a specific urban demand configuration. For example, a single node can be configured to represent all Detached homes with a Pool.

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Contents

Table of Contents
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Node Dependencies

The Behavioural Water Use node requires that the following inputs are configured through the Urban Developer Options:

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If you specify sampled appliances and occupancy, you must specify a minimum number of houses in order to provide a statistically-reliable sample of the household occupancy and appliance type.
Due to random sampling in any particular Urban Developer run, the percentage of houses actually sampled for each household occupancy and appliance type (the sampled percentage) will not be exactly the same as what you specify (the true percentage).

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Sampled appliances and occupancy configuration

Select Configure

Average Behavioural

 

 

For Water Use nodes set to behavioural mode, there are two options for specifying their configuration.

From the Urban Developer main menu, select Configure > Water Use. The following table explains the menu options.

 

These water use configuration options act only on Water Use nodes within the scenario that are set to the behavioural model. These options have no effect on any Water Use nodes in the same scenario that use an Average Daily model.

You can have water use nodes with both Average Daily and Behavioural models active in the same scenario, but the settings specified on the Configure menu only affect those water use nodes in the scenario which use the Behavioural model.

Behavioural model with fixed appliances and occupancy

The behavioural water use model configuration with fixed appliances and occupancy allows you to set appliance types for each end use (showers, washing machines, and toilets), household occupancy and outdoor use for each water use node.

Using the behavioural model with fixed appliances and occupancy is the recommended approach when you are simulating a smaller number of houses (< 400), and you want to specify exactly the type of appliances and occupancy for each house.

Similarly to the average daily model, you select the supply source preference for each individual end use.

For this behavioural model configuration (fixed appliances and occupancy) you set the indoor end-use appliance types and occupancy for each water

Menu item Notes Fixed appliances and occupancy This option produces a repeatable, probabilistic simulation of water use, using fixed (ie user-specified) appliances and occupancy rates for each water use node. Sampled appliances and occupancy This option produces a repeatable (if configured in Random Seed Settings, see below), probabilistic simulation of water use, using sampled appliances and occupancy from user-defined probability distributions. Random Seed Settings This option allows you to set the random seed used by the BESS model for water use simulation - this enables production of repeatable random series. See Water Use node (page 143) for more information.  Table

 

These water use configuration options act only on Water Use nodes within the scenario that are set to the behavioural model. These options have no effect on any Water Use nodes in the same scenario that use an Average Daily model.

You can have water use nodes with both Average Daily and Behavioural models active in the same scenario, but the settings specified on the Configure menu only affect those water use nodes in the scenario which use the Behavioural model. 

Thyer, M.A., Duncan, H., Coombes, P., Kuczera, G. and Micevski, T. (2009). A Probabilistic Behavioural Approach for the Dynamic Modelling of Indoor Household Water Use. 32nd Hydrology and Water Resources Symposium, 30 November – 3 December 2009, Newcastle, Australia.

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The allocation and application of these parameters is further described in the Urban Settings section in the Urban Developer Plugin User Guide and the  Behavioural Model Configuration section in the Urban Developer Plugin SRG.

Restrictions

There are restrictions on which node inputs and outputs you can connect together. See Urban Developer node connection rules.

The Behavioural Water Use node is available for Urban Scenarios only.

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Node Properties
Node Properties
Node Properties

Node PropertyNotes
Number of housesSpecify the number of houses the node represents 
Occupants per houseSpecify the number of occupants per household (applies only when the behavioural model configuration is set to Appliances. When the behavioural model configuration is set to Sampled appliances and occupancy, these properties are grayed out in the user interface. Refer to section 2. Urban Settings for details.)
Average appliance demand

Switches between a Stochastic (BESS) and Average method of demand generation

Stochastic demand generation will use random number generators to see if water use events occur throughout the day, based on the hourly likelihood for the particular end use. Some end use items also have a random generator for the volume of water used and / or the length of the event. 

Average demand generation will calculate the average event likelihood and demand volume for a timestep. This means each end use will generate the same demand rate for all timesteps until parameters change to affect end use item rating being used, number of people in the house, or number of houses being modelled.

Outdoor use is the exception to this rule as it uses a specified data source, function, or monthly pattern for this demand generation.

End-use appliance type

Indoor end-use includes showers, taps and dishwashers, toilet and dishwashers as appliance types. Specifications for indoor water use appliance types are set under the Urban Developer Options described in section 2. Urban Settings.

Pool is currently the only end-use available under Outdoor end-use

Outdoor average daily demandThe average daily outdoor demand can be specified using a single value, a time series, a function or a monthly pattern. By default a monthly pattern is applied.
Supply source priorities

For each indoor/outdoor end-use, specify which supply sources are available, in order of preference.

Discharge breakdown

For each indoor/outdoor end-use, specify the percentage of water discharged as blackwater, greywater, or Irrigation/other wastewater.

User Interface

The Behavioural Water Use node is configured via the node Feature Editor, illustrated below in Figure 1. to Figure 4. The first window of the Behavioural Water Use node (Figure 1) allows the user to set the Number of houses which will use the end-use configuration specified on this node. This will be 1 if applying the node as a template for an Urban Combination Configuration run. Water end-use is categorised as Indoor and Outdoor use. 

The average appliance demand is an option that can be used in conjunction with sampled or fixed appliances and occupancy.

Average values for usage frequency and water consumption are used, rather than simulating the water consumption for individual appliance usage events by sampling from the probability distributions set up under the Urban Developer Options described in section 2. Urban Settings. The average values are configured in the Appliances menu.

The average appliance demand model is enabled using the Use Average Demand check box in the Behavioural Water Use node Feature Editor.

Figure 1. Behavioural Water Use node editor

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Indoor demand

Four end-use options are available for Indoor water demand allocation (Figure 2). Each end-use is defined by an end-use Rating (according to specification configured in the Urban Settings interface of the Urban Developer Options), a Supply type and a Discharge type. 

Supply occurs according to the priority allocated to a particular Supply type. For example, for the end-use Toilet (illustrated in Figure 2) rainwater is the first preference for toilet flushing and, if no rainwater is available, then Mains water is used as the second preference for flushing. Un-checking Use for a supply source specifies that it will not supply that particular end-use. Two unspecified Alternate Supply options are available to represent supply from a source other that Mains or Rainwater, such as greywater.

Discharge can got to blackwater, greywater or an irrigation/other option. Discharge to each option is allocated as a part of the total discharge and the values will be re-scaled so that they sum to 100%.

Figure 2. Configuring Indoor end-use options in the Behavioural Water Use node editor

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Outdoor demand

Outdoor demand typically replicates a seasonal variation in water use (e.g. domestic garden use which is higher during dryer months) and can therefore be modelled using a Time series, a Function or a Monthly pattern (Figure 3). Outdoor demand is also more likely to be impacted by long-term variations in climate.

As with the Indoor end-uses, a Supply type and a Discharge type are available for Outdoor demands. A Pool (Figure 4) can be added and can have different Supply and Discharge types to the general Outdoor demand.  

Figure 3. Configuring Outdoor demand options in the Behavioural Water Use node editor

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Figure 4. Configuring Outdoor demand options in the Behavioural Water Use node editor

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References

Roberts, P. (2005) 2004 Residential End Use Measurement Study, Final Report: Yarra Valley Water, Victoria.

Thyer, M., Micevski, T.,

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Kuczera,

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G.,

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and Coombes,

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P. (2011)

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A Behavioural Approach

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to Stochastic End Use Modelling. Paper

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presented at Oz Water, 9-11 May 2011, Adelaide.

Acknowledgements

This material has been adapted from:

eWater Cooperative Research Centre (2011) Urban Developer User Guide: Urban Developer v1.0.0, eWater Cooperative Research Centre, Canberra, 29 June 2011. ISBN 978-1-921543-40-1