Water for services advanced study. Report on Grant Agreement No

Transcription

1 Report on Grant Agreement No

2 Statistics Sweden 3(21) Contents Abstract 4 Background 5 The Project 5 Objective 5 Project plan 5 Methodology 6 Phase 1: Preparation of study 6 Defining a ski facility and golf course 7 Identify and locate ski facilities 7 Identify and locate golf course facilities 9 Hotels, restaurants and running facilities 10 Designing a questionnaire 10 Consultation with the Board of Swedish Industry 11 and Commerce for Better Regulation. Phase 2: Carrying out the survey 11 Sample Population 11 Collecting water data from the sample of 284 establishments 12 Phase 3: Calculations and result 12 Adjustment for non-response and estimation 13 Data quality 13 Result 14 Discussion and Conclusions 17 Appendix I 20 Appendix II 21

3 Statistics Sweden 4(21) Abstract This report was compiled according to Grant Agreement No "Water for Services advanced study". The report includes the development of a method to improve the collection of data for water statistics within the service sector. Ski facilities and golf courses are by far the largest users of water within the service sector outside urban areas. One of the objectives was to define and identify ski- and golf courses to be able to carry out a survey for collecting water data. The result from the survey is then used to report the water volumes and type of water within the two service activities with greater accuracy. The ski facilities and golf courses were identified through the appropriate service sectors branch organisation. A questionnaire was designed and a sample of 132 ski facilities and 152 golf courses was defined. The result of the survey was supplemented by estimations for the non-surveyed population. This is the first time a survey was carried out in the two service sectors. Total water volumes for ski facilities together with golf courses were 17.2 million m 3. The amount of water was also regionally distributed on NUTS 2 level and the five Swedish water districts.

4 Statistics Sweden 5(21) Background During 2004 Statistics Sweden made a first estimate on the water use within the service sector in Sweden in the report "A methodology on collecting data on water use for private and public services outside urban areas" (agreement No 2002.CE.16.0.AT.158). The report found that the total water volume used in the service sector outside urban areas was estimated to just more that 28 million m 3 for the year It stands for just less than 1 percent of total annual water use in Sweden. One of the conclusions from the first report was that the largest water users within the service sector outside urban areas were by far the golf courses and the ski facilities. The main use of water for golf courses was for irrigation and the ski facilities uses water in snow guns for snowmaking. Only the golf courses were estimated to 15.5 million m 3 of water per year and the volumes for the ski activities were 3.9 million m 3. Together the two facilities represented approximately 70 percent of total water use in the service sector. The report also stated that the methods for data collection and analysis must be improved to avoid the assumptions that were made and make the estimates more accurate. The Project Objective The objective of the action was to improve the methodology and collection of water use statistics from the service sector, especially ski facilities and golf courses, on national and regional level. The methodology for collecting data on water abstractions and water discharge was to carry out a survey and then estimate the water use for the facilities. The methodology can be of value in other European countries. Project plan The project started in April 2007 and was planned in detail according to the Gantt schedule in figure 1.

5 Statistics Sweden 6(21) Phase: Apr Maj Jun Jul Aug Sep Okt Nov Dec Jan Feb Mar Apr 1. Preparation of survey 1.1 Project start 1.2 Project plan 1.3 Define sample population 1.4 Identify population 1.5 Design Questionnaire 1.6 Consultation about data 2. Carrying out the survey 2.1 Sample population 2.2 Collecting water data 3. Calculations and result 3.1 Adjustment for non-response 3.2 Data quality 3.3 Result 4. Final report 4 april Figure 1. Gantt schedule for the project The schedule has been updated and the final report delayed by three weeks because of additional data collecting. Methodology Ski facilities use water as an essential part in snowmaking. Snow production needs large volumes of water and to be able to ensure a sufficient water supply a lot of facilities have some sort of reservoir. According to one of the Swedish snow gun producers, you will need m 3 of water to cover 500 m 2 with 20 cm of snow. Meteorologically the best temperature for snow making is at minus five to minus fifteen and the humidity in the air should be less than 80 percent. A golf course uses large water volumes for irrigation. Mainly tees, golf greens and fairways are irrigated according to the superintendents and greens keepers. To be able to develop a method for estimating water volumes of the most demanding water users within the service sector some steps hade to be taken. Phase 1: Preparation of study The first phase of the study included the following steps: Defining a ski facility and golf course facility Identify and locate the facilities Hotels, restaurants and running facilities Designing a questionnaire Consultation with the Board of Swedish Industry and Commerce for Better Regulation.

6 Statistics Sweden 7(21) Defining a ski resort and golf course The Swedish Standard for Industrial Classification was revised The economic classifications have been better integrated with the United Nations International Standard Industrial Classification and are also closely connected to the NACE Rev. 2, the EU s revised Standard for Industrial Classification. According to the revised version, we can clearly define both ski facilities and golf courses. Operation of ski facilities has the NACE classification and the operation of golf courses has the classification Identify and locate ski facilities Statistics Sweden has a central Business Register (FDB) witch contains registered enterprises and workplaces. According to an earlier feasibility study from 2004, there were 39 NACE classified ski facilities in the FDBregister. In 2007 there are 86 companies divided into 96 different workplaces. In the FDB-register there is a possibility to geocode on coordinates but only 44 of the ski facilities had coordinates that could be used. It is possible to use Swedish CORINE data and select the land use class that represents ski slopes. After a selection there are 224 ski slopes in the CORINE dataset that had a geographical extension. Unfortunately the CORINE data doesn't hold any useful attributes. The difficulties arise when we try to combine the different sources. In the example below we find the ski facility of Åre, Skistar AB on the map. Map 1. The geographic localisation of Sweden's largest ski facility Åre, Skistar AB. Åre is by far Sweden's largest ski establishment with visitors during the season 2006/2007. The ski facility covers a large amount of area from Duved in the West to 3 kilometres east of the built-up area of Åre. According to the CORINE dataset, there are four ski slopes in the area. Based only on

7 Statistics Sweden 8(21) the information from the registers there are no possibilities to connect each of the four areas to its correct operating establishment. When asking the branch organisation for the ski facilities in Sweden, the Swedish lift association (SLAO) the members rise to 236 instead of 86. According to the association 99 percent of the ski facilities hold a membership in SLAO. More than 60 percent of the SLAO members use snow gun for snowmaking. The lift association also presents visitors statistics for the 50 largest ski facilities during the season 2006/2007. A drawback is that it is hard to geographically pinpoint the 236 facilities on a map more accurately than by postal code. In some cases the facility is even geographically matched to the closest postal code because the larger ski facilities own company postal numbers that are not geographically located in the postal code map. See map 2 for location of the SLAO-members. Map 2. Geocoding of ski facilities using postal code.

8 Statistics Sweden 9(21) Identify and locate golf course facilities The Golf courses in the early feasibility study from 2004 numbered 309. In 2007 there are 812 companies in the FDB-register that are registered with the NACE classification A drawback is that within the classification we find golf instructors, course design companies, miniature golf facilities and golf shops along the simple golf courses. There are only a few of these that also have useful coordinates. In the Swedish CORINE data there are 452 objects classified as golf courses but we were not able to connect the objects with any attributes such as a name or address for a business establishment. After establishing a contact with the Swedish Golf Federation (SFG), the trade organisation for Swedish golf, we got a member s figure of 445 golf courses. According to the trade organisation there are only a few golf courses that don't have membership in the trade organisation. With the Golf federations register it is possible to identify the golf facilities and geocode them with the same prerequisites as for the ski facilities. See map 3 for geographic location of the members of the Swedish Golf Federation. Map 3. Geocoding of golf courses using postal code.

9 Statistics Sweden 10(21) Hotels, restaurants and running facilities With an insufficient FDB-register together with the CORINE dataset it is rather difficult to try to identify restaurants and hotels within each ski facility and golf course. In the example of Åre above there are the densely populated areas of Åre and Duved more or less within the ski facility and every hotel and restaurant therein should have been contacted. During the seasonal peaks guests are even staying at hotels in nearby cities and holiday villages, which make it even harder to delimit the areas were hotels and restaurants are to be identified. Besides that the most extensive water use comes from the facilities themselves with the snowmaking procedure and irrigation of the golf courses. A typical Swedish household uses about 200 litres of water per day. For hotel guests that figure is 100 litres of water per guest a day according to the report A methodology on collecting data on water use for private and public services outside urban area. The assumption is based on the idea that most guests use water for taking a shower or bath and not for housekeeping. According to the Swedish lift association the total day card holders for the 50 largest ski facilities were 6.2 million during the season 2006/2007. Assume that every visitor is staying at a hotel, in that case the total use of water is 0.62 million m 3 per year compared to the calculated water use for snow guns that is 7.5 million m 3. Hotels and restaurants are not treated further in this report because of the difficulties in identifying them together with the rather small impact on the total water volumes. Designing a questionnaire Two questionnaires were designed for the survey, as shown in appendix I and II (in Swedish). The content of the golf course questionnaire is divided in two sections and the ski facility questionnaire is divided into three sections. The main parts of the questionnaires are the same, aside from that the first question for the ski facilities that concerns the use of snow guns during the last season. The content for the ski facilities is described below: 1. The use of snow guns. Did the facility use snow guns during the season 2006/ Water use. Amount of water (2 a) specified on type (2 b), ground water (grundvatten) and/or surface water (ytvatten). In addition the ski facilities are asked about the water supply (2 c), municipal water supply (kommunal) or ski facilities own supply (Eget). 3. Time needed to fill in the questionnaire. Working time in minutes.

10 Statistics Sweden 11(21) The ski and golf facilities could choose if they wanted to answer the postal questionnaire or fill in an electronic questionnaire. Individual user codes and Internet addresses were found in the letters sent to the respondents. An introductory letter was written as a first page to accompany the questionnaire. Consultation with the Board of Swedish Industry and Commerce for Better Regulation In October the Board of Swedish Industry and Commerce for Better Regulation was informed about the forthcoming survey and data gathering. After a few weeks, a written positive answer came in November and the survey was approved by the board. Phase 2: Carrying out the survey The second phase included the following steps: Sample population Collecting water data from the sample of 284 establishments Sample population The sample survey was carried out with some restrictions. The first restriction was the budget. The second restriction is the policy of Statistics Sweden, which states that the total burden for the respondents shall be reduced. We chose the following sample: Table 1. Sample population for the ski facilities Ski facilities Number ski facilities The sample 52 largest The Rest Total Table 2. Sample population for the golf facilities Number of holes Number of golf courses The sample > Sum

11 Statistics Sweden 12(21) The sample was designed to include the largest companies in an attempt to catch the largest water users with better quality. Technically, the sample was a stratified random sample. The sample for the ski facilities was made with consideration of the volume of yearly visitors during a four year period for the largest ski facilities. The sample of 152 golf courses was drawn with consideration to the amount of holes for each golf course. Collecting water data from the sample of 284 establishments A postal survey was sent to the 132 ski facilities and 152 golf courses on the 12 of December The respondents had the opportunity to answer the questionnaire on paper or electronically. Four weeks later, on 15 January, the ones that did not answer the questionnaire the first time received a reminder letter. A second reminder was sent on 5 February. At the time of the first reminder we had a non-response rate at 71 percent. Around the second reminder the non-response rate dropped to 44 percent. After another week we started to contact the establishments that we had not received an answer from. The final result came on 28 of February and we could close the survey with a non-response rate of 30 percent. The data collecting process is shown in table 3. Table 3. Data collection process during the survey, answers in paper and electronically at different data collection stages Data collection First Second Telephone Final answer reminder reminder contact Paper Elect. Paper Elect. Paper Elect. Paper Elect. Golf facility Ski facility Total Non-response rate 71% 44% 38% 30% Phase 3: Calculations and results The third phase included the following steps: Adjustment for non-response and estimation Data quality Result

12 Statistics Sweden 13(21) Adjustment for non-response and estimation At the first stage of the sampling process we divided the golf courses and the ski facilities into different classes. The golf courses were divided in size classes. The ski resorts were divided according to size and geographic location. At the final step of the process we adjusted for non-response of the sample with the average of the class that the respondent had been divided into, except for the 52 largest ski facilities. We had register information of visitors in the largest ski facilities. There was a strong correlation between visitors and water used. We used information about visitors to estimate the nonresponse in this case. Data quality The non-response rate was: Table 4. Non-response rate Golf courses Ski facilities 30 % 30 % The non-response rate is 30% and such is considered normal for these types of questionnaires. The two groups have different problems. The golf courses are off-season and the greens keeper usually has vacation during the period December - January. The ski facilities have peak season in this time of year. They have little spare time to fill in this questionnaire. There are two types of uncertainty in the questionnaire. The first question is how many of the respondents that estimate their water use and how many measure their water use? The second question concerns how much we have to calculate for non-response and estimates in the sample survey. About 30% of all water used was measured. Estimated water volume was 19%. The calculated water volume was 51%. Table 5. Measured, estimated and calculated water volumes Measured Estimated Calculated Sum (water volume) (water volume) (water volume)

13 Statistics Sweden 14(21) Result This is the first time we have put forward a questionnaire in these sectors. Previously the service sector has been calculated by register data. The results in total were close to each other. The calculated results for these activities from the previous study in 2004 were 19.4 million m 3 and the result from this survey are 17.2 million m 3. Table 6. Result for total water volumes Groundwater (1000 m 3 ) Surface water (1000 m 3 ) Sum (1000 m 3 ) Golf courses Ski facilities Total However, the result of the survey and the estimation from 2004 in each sector was quite different. The estimate for the golf courses was 15.5 million m 3 and our result was 9.5 million m 3. The difference has been caused by a very high estimated average water use per golf course. The investigated year was dry but not extremely dry, which can explain some of the difference. The old estimation of the water used in ski resorts was 4 million m 3.The result of the questionnaire was 7.5 million m 3. This difference is due to the insufficient register used for the estimation. There was little use of municipal water in the ski facilities and it was too uncertain to calculate. The use of municipal water in golf courses was about 10% of all water used. The result is distributed by both NUTS2 and water district levels. Sweden is divided into 8 NUTS 2 administrative areas and 5 large water districts which are shown in map 4.

14 Statistics Sweden 15(21) Map 4. Swedish NUTS 2 and Water districts Table 7. The result of total water use in NUTS 2 NUTS 2 Ski facilities. (numbers) Golf courses (numbers) Water Volumes (1000 m 3 ) SE SE SE SE SE SE SE SE Total

15 Statistics Sweden 16(21) Table 8. The result of total water use within the water districts Water district Ski facilities. (numbers) Golf courses. (numbers) Water volumes (1000 m 3 ) Total The highest water usage is in the SE23/Water district 2 region. In this region we have many of Sweden s largest ski resorts and also many golf courses. In the northern part of Sweden (SE 33/Water district 1) there are very few golf courses and little use of water for snow production. The size of the ski facilities has a large impact on the water used. The 15 largest ski facilities stand for over half of the water volume. Table 9. The correlation between size and water use for ski facilities Ski facilities Numbers of ski Percent of water used. facilities. 15 largest 15 55% Rest % Total % The size of the golf course also has an impact on the water used. But the variance is not that great as in the ski facilities. Table 10. Size of golf course and water use Number of holes Number of golf courses Percent water used > % % < % Total %

16 Statistics Sweden 17(21) Discussion and conclusions In this project a survey has been carried out for Swedish ski facilities and golf courses outside urban areas. The total water use from the questionnaire for ski facilities and golf courses in 2008 is divided into NUTS 2 and Water districts in map 5 below. Map 5. Total water use presented geographically.

17 Statistics Sweden 18(21) A method to improve the collection of data for water use statistics of the service sector has been developed. Through contacts with the different trade organisations for ski facilities and golf courses it was possible to identify and locate their members. According to the trade organisations more than 95 percent of the companies possess membership in the trade organisation. Through the trade organisation s register a sample was made where emphasis was laid on visitor volume for ski facilities and number of holes for golf courses. The number of visitors gave a clear correlation to total water use. The 15 largest ski facilities investigated within the sample account for 55% of total water use. For the golf courses the size of course has an impact on water use, though not as great as for ski facilities. A possibility for a clearer correlation could be to use the number of green cards in combination with number of members for golf courses in an attempt to improve data quality. An estimate of water use within the service sector outside urban areas was made in the first study from The calculated results was made with a lot of assumptions and came up with figures for total water use around 19.4 million m 3. The result from the questionnaire from 2008 is 17.2 million m 3 water. Besides the assumptions that were made in 2004 the figures are quite close at a total level but not below that. Is the improved result of 17.2 million m 3 for water use stable or not? The meteorological changes in weather between years will affect the figures in total. During the survey year 2006/2007, some of the larger ski facilities in the north were not able to open before the end of December because of the warm weather. If the temperature does not drop below zero Celsius, then snowmaking with snow guns is out of the question as well. In a further study the amount of water used can be tested with regard to stability. Doing a repeated survey for a three year period with a limited sample consisting of the larger ski facilities and golf courses, the results will be even more improved. A limited sample will also reduce the cost of a questionnaire and the subsequent data collection. From the experience of the drawbacks during the project we have learned quite a lot. In short the problems encountered were: Insufficient registers Delimiting and identifying hotels and restaurants Seasonal differences Not separating the survey The FBD-register is improved by Statistics Sweden continuously and between the first study 2004 and 2008 the register has a higher quality with more accurate information. Nevertheless information is in many respects still

18 Statistics Sweden 19(21) missing for a lot of companies and especially as regards the geographical coordinates for the service sector outside urban areas. When it came to identifying hotels and restaurants within the ski facilities and golf courses, we could not delimit the areas in a proper way. On the other hand the water use for hotels and restaurants will not affect the large amount of water that irrigation and snow guns account for. During the later part of the project, we had to rearrange the Gantt schedule and delay the final report by three weeks. The data collecting was delayed because of seasonal difficulties that affected the survey. The golf season in Sweden starts on the first of April and ends in November in the southern parts of the country. For Golf courses in the northern part of the country, the season goes from May to October. On the other hand the ski-season in Sweden stretches from January to March in the south and from the second half of November to last of April in the north in any given normal year. Opening season Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec Ski facilities southern Sweden Ski facilities northern Sweden Golf courses southern Sweden Golf Courses northern Sweden Figure 2. Opening season in a normal year for ski facilities and golf courses When the golf courses are off season, the ski facilities have their peak period. This means that they both had difficulties in answering the survey. The best way to handle that situation is to separate the surveys and give the different service sectors more time for answering a questionnaire. The golf preseason is in the beginning of April, so four months forward could be a good basis for hoping the respondents can complete the questionnaire. For the ski facilities, it could also be a good idea to start a survey in preseason and give the respondents time to fill in the questionnaire. The methodologies of using the ski- and golf-sectors own trade register can be a suitable method in other EU countries as well. But the seasonal problems have to be taken into account and will differ regionally within Europe. To be able to improve the quality of water use statistics for both the regional environmental questionnaire and the joint Eurostat/OECD questionnaire, it is important to ensure that the largest facilities are included in the sample.

19 Statistics Sweden 20(21) Appendix I Questionnaire sent to golf courses

20 Statistics Sweden 21(21) Appendix II Questionnaire sent to ski facilities