Durham Region, on the eastern border of Toronto, is anticipating a doubling of its currentpopulation of 600,000 over the next twenty-eight years. Consequently, the Region is facing thechallenge of this growth by incorporating water efficiency into its infrastructure planning. Thisis viable because it is more cost effective to approach infrastructure growth with a combination ofwater efficiency programming and system expansion rather than just expanding the infrastructureby marching lock-step with growth.At present, the Region has just completed the updating of its Water Efficiency Plan. All of thecore programs under the plan are justified economically by illustrating how they are lessexpensive than deriving the same amount of capacity through infrastructure expansion. Acost/benefit analysis was calculated to ensure each of these initiatives is less expensive thansystem expansions. However, there are other pilot programs whose economic and environmentalviability have not yet been determined. This paper discusses three of these programs thatare not only pilots, but also designed to be catalysts for inducing greater water efficiency after thepilots are completed. The first pilot is in the Township of Uxbridge, one of eight municipalities within the Region. The Region initiated discussions with Township staff and the builders (of single family and multi-residential buildings) currently active in Uxbridge to discuss performance disparity between the toilets that the Region qualified for subsidies (for existing, pre-1996 housing), compared to the toilets builders were installing. The second pilot involves drought tolerant grass seed. The Region initiated a trial of nine blends of grass seeds marketed as drought tolerant. The seed was hydro-seeded into plots to simulate how the builders would apply it. The project will provide a comparative demonstration between various drought tolerant turfgrass species and mixtures. The third pilot involves a water and energy efficient demonstration community. Durham Region in Ontario, Canada partnered with home builder Tribute Communities to create a community which uses less water and less energy by upgrading water-using fixtures and appliances indoors and refining turf and plant choices outdoors. The costs associated with upgrading, monitoring, and reporting the savings will be borne by new home-buyers, Durham Region and its funding partners.
