Internal determinants or external drivers? The case of U.S. water reuse policy adoption

Aline Banboukian, Valerie M. Thomas, Marilyn Brown, D. Cale Reeves, Kaye Husbands Fealing

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

Abstract

Many U.S. states have policies for water reuse; some do not. This study analyses what drives the adoption of water reuse policy. We consider internal drivers including drought, precipitation, population growth, and economic reliance on water. We consider learning, emulation, and competition as potential external drivers. We use binomial logistic regression and event history analysis to evaluate the relation of policy adoption to these drivers. We do not find evidence for learning, emulation, or competition as drivers of water reuse policy; that is, the policies of other states are not found to drive water reuse policy adoption. We find that internal drivers - drought, population growth, and strong economic reliance on water are statistically significant and positively associated with policy adoption. These results contrast with drivers of energy policy adoption, for which external factors such as regional proximity are more important.

Original languageEnglish
Article number108072
JournalResources, Conservation and Recycling
Volume215
DOIs
StatePublished - Apr 2025

Funding

This work was partially supported by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (Grant 2018-68011-28371).

Keywords

  • Event history analysis
  • Logistic regression
  • Policy adoption
  • Water policy
  • Water reuse policy

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