Our Own Research into Yuck Factor

Running Arizona's fastest-growing water and wastewater utilities, during record State growth, and in the midst of 13 years of drought required my company, Global Water Resources, to rely on regional-sized water recycling systems. To date, those systems have reduced our potable water demand by more than 750 million gallons; but to get there we had to overcome what Peter Friederici calls, "The Yuck Factor".

We hired a public affairs/lobbying firm, and a well-known ad agency to assess the public's attitudes towards water recycling; and to develop outreach and education materials to change those attitudes based on facts.
To see the outreach materials, visit (http://www.gwresources.com/community-outreach.php)

We conducted two sets of polls, one in 2005, one in 2007; and we conducted several focus groups to 'get into the details' of people's concerns with water recycling. Here's what we have learned so far:

• Most people don't know that water is recycled (69% didn't when we began, 57% didn't in 2007). This means that utilities and government leaders aren't doing enough to educate the public.
• With information, people become supportive of water recycling - our 2005 poll showed us that 35% of the public opposed recycled water use to flush toilets, two years into our campaign, that number is down to 14%.
• By simply explaining how we clean and treat recycled water, we doubled support for recycled water use for: golf courses, toilets, car washing, lawn watering. When we take the time to treat customer concerns seriously, and explain how processes work - people support sustainable water practices.