Water supply and management is becoming a major issue due to climate change, depletion of natural resources and rapid urbanization. It is crucial for the water regulatory authorities to be able to forecast the future demand and propose a resilient and sustainable infrastructure for effective water management. In most parts of the urban regions of Pakistan, there are no proper metering of water and regulatory authorities have limited data on water consumption and required water supply. Installing Smart water meters requires significant funding and time commitment. There is, therefore, an urgent need to forecast with as much as possible the exact household water demand, in order to best manage available water resources and delivery. This requires system analysis for combined demand and supply. Many existing approaches propose the analysis of water resources planning and management through modeling and simulation.
Modeling and simulation enables us to replicate a real world system for suitable risk-free dynamic experiments. Simulation models of water consumption deals with modeling of individual’s characteristics and water consumption behavior as agents, as well as the modeling of external environment, supply processes and water flows as system dynamics. These external factors have significant importance in analyzing interdependent behavioral aspects. Modeling and simulation of domestic water consuming entities and water resources help in analysis and management planning of water resources. It provides a control over consumption by predicting the tasks which are necessary for satisfying the volumetric flow usage. Modeling water consumption of different consumers such as domestic, industrial and agricultural sectors, helps in forecasting water demand by analyzing activity-based consumption and by gaining the insights of the demand dynamics.
In this paper, we propose the development of behavioural simulation model for household water consumption at a dual resolution (i.e., Macro and Micro level) using hybrid approach. Our hybrid approach combines Agent Based Modeling (ABM) to model individuals’ water consumption behavior at a micro level, and System Dynamic (SD) approach to aggregate the modeled behavior of a population in an urban area, at macro level in order to forecast short-term and long-term water demand. The goal of this research is to develop a framework for the regulatory authorities, that can help in monitoring of water resources, plan effective supply of water at household level and forecast short-term and long-term water consumption demand. It further aids in gaining insights of the behavior patterns of water consumption in different areas, and improve the performance of the water supply process through demand side management.
