such as the American Civil Liberties Union in the past <\/a>have raised questions about privacy invasions from smart home devices, including electric and water meters monitored by utilities. Especially by combining information from multiple meters, hackers or other bad actors could watch patterns and learn when people are home or away, are cooking, taking showers or other personal habits.\u00a0<\/p>\nCline said a better analogy than a controversial Flock camera is to see a smart water meter as a personal fitness tracker. \u201cIt gives you data and you are able to identify patterns that can improve your overall health if you make changes,\u201d Cline said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Aurora points out the smart meters for every customer work both ways, as a protection from leaks and potential property damage. Customers are able to log on and track their own use at the same time the city sees it, and could recognize a home leak while away on vacation, for example. During droughts, the meters will be one key to helping maintain reservoir storage for the benefit of the whole community, Cline said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere is a definite footprint that goes along with the data that indicates irrigation is taking place,\u201d Cline said. \u201cWe have that pretty locked in where we can see when somebody\u2019s irrigating, and so that\u2019s why it\u2019s interesting, because even when we send a warning, people are like, \u2018But I didn\u2019t!\u2019 And then we\u2019ll show them the data, and they\u2019re like, \u2018OK, I can\u2019t argue with you, right?\u2019 \u201c\u00a0<\/p>\n
Denver Water, while enjoying higher water storage rates at its mountain reservoirs that have seen better snowpack, is not satisfied with customer savings rates and is now shifting somewhat from \u201ceducation\u201d to \u201cenforcement\u201d mode.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Denver had sent out nearly 3,600 warning letters but only five fines by the beginning of August. Fines will ramp up now that customers know what the rules are and Denver Water knows more about where the problem customers are, officials said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Aurora Water, by contrast, has issued 234 fines after sending out more than 2,500 warning letters, including 10 of the highest $2,000 fines to businesses and large irrigation consumers. Only three customers were issued a second fine at the $250 residential level, Aurora Water said, and none had been issued a third fine. Aurora\u2019s fines total more than $70,000.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Now that Denver Water has weeks of data on actual water use during drought restrictions, the agency can focus its communications on suburban areas with bigger lawns that haven\u2019t cut back, said Greg Fisher, the utility\u2019s manager of demand planning. Some of those suburban customers have no idea it\u2019s Denver Water that collects their mountain runoff and delivers it to their local water utilities.\u00a0<\/p>\n
With only 5,000 advanced meters installed for 250,000 taps, Fisher said, word of mouth enforcement confirmed by onsite visits from Denver Water employees will continue to be the standard for warnings and fines.\u00a0<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/Drought-01-1200x800.jpg\")
Water flows down the South Platte River in the Jean K. Tool State Wildlife Area amidst an ongoing drought Wednesday, July 22, 2026, in Morgan County. (Cheney Orr, The Colorado Sun via Report for America)<\/p>\n
\u201cWe continue to rely on, and I think it\u2019s a pretty inventive idea, of letting our customers report water waste violations,\u201d he said. \u201cEven with the water people out on the street, we can\u2019t be everywhere. So giving our customers the ability to report has been pretty powerful and I think effective for us.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Denver Water officials do not anticipate asking their board this season to approve the next drought stage that would take lawn watering down to one day a week and add other restrictions. Denver Water would have to change its rate structure again to charge more for lawn watering that does occur to make up for loss of revenue from restrictions.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Plus, the utility thinks it\u2019s a longer-term challenge to convince customers to change habits and stay \u201con board\u201d with drought restrictions in the middle of what could be a multiyear crisis, Fisher said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have a long game,\u201d Fisher said. \u201cThis thing\u2019s going to last a minimum of 12 more months, in my opinion, save for some sort of record-breaking snowfall this winter. So we\u2019re in it for the long haul. I think we need to continue to up the message as we see conditions change. But at the same time, we really need to support our customers and have them stick with us for that extended period.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
People are capable of change, Denver Water officials said. The last drought this severe for Front Range customers was 2002.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cOur customers are using 100 million gallons less per day this year than they did in 2002, which is just stunning,\u201d Fisher said. \u201cAnd that translates to being actually 14% higher in our reservoir storage now than we were in 2002, because of our customers\u2019 efficiency efforts over the last quarter century. We\u2019re feeling really good about that. And that\u2019s with significantly more population. \u2026 200 to 250,000 more people.\u201d<\/p>\n
Type of Story: News<\/p>\n
Based on facts, either observed and verified directly by the reporter, or reported and verified from knowledgeable sources.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Aurora Water doesn\u2019t much care which two days in a week you water your lawn, amid this historic…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":980301,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[23],"tags":[383235,393381,285,286383,746,159,67,132,68,527,49371],"class_list":["post-980300","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-environment","tag-2026-drought","tag-aurora-water","tag-climate-change","tag-denver-water","tag-environment","tag-science","tag-united-states","tag-unitedstates","tag-us","tag-water","tag-water-conservation"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/117037897517144936","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/980300","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=980300"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/980300\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/980301"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=980300"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=980300"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=980300"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/IMG_7786-874x1200.jpg\")
Denver Parks and Recreation irrigation and conservation crews check newly installed sprinklers heads at Harvard Gulch Park on July 17, 2026. In the southwest corner of the park, nine raised heads replace 18 heads formerly covering the same space, and will rise above native grasses that use less water than traditional turf. (Michael Booth, The Colorado Sun)<\/p>\n