Manage Your Water Use With WaterSmart

In addition to what WaterSmart offers,  most single-family residential customers will receive monthly Home Water Reports by email or mail. All residents have access to their Home Water Report in WaterSmart. 

With WaterSmart, you can:

• View your hourly, daily, and weekly water use from your new Advanced Metering Infrastructure (AMI).
• Sign up for custom water use notifications.
• Compare your water use to your neighbors and determine if you’re more or less efficient than similar households with My Water Score. 
• Identify where in your house you’re using the most water — and how to reduce consumption in those places to save money. 
• Get recommended rebates and efficiency tips customized to your water usage patterns and home profile. 
• Find and fix possible leaks with automated alerts that let you know when your water use patterns suggest a leak. 
• Investigate a high water bill with factors like longer billing cycles and possible leaks.  

For the most accurate results, update your household profile in WaterSmart. Your household profile takes into account information related to your household size, water-using appliances, landscaping, and daily activities. 

With WaterSmart, you can: 

• View your hourly, daily, and weekly water use from your new Advanced Metering Infrastructure (AMI).
• Sign up for custom water use notifications.
• Track your water use and compare it previous years.
• Get recommended rebates and efficiency tips customized to your water usage patterns and business profile. 
• Investigate a high water bill with factors like longer billing cycles and possible leaks.  

In WaterSmart you can set custom alerts for high daily usage. Relatively higher daily usage can be normal due to irrigation. If you do not wish to receive notifications for irrigation, you can increase your notification threshold.

For residential customers, Your Water Score compares your water usage to other Palo Alto households that have the same number of occupants and a similarly sized yard.

WaterSmart has a strict Privacy Policy, no personally-identifiable customer information is shared with other users.  

In WaterSmart you can view your hourly, daily, weekly, and monthly water usage by going to the Track tab or clicking View Use under My Daily Use.

In WaterSmart you can easily download your hourly water usage data by going to the Settings tab and clicking on download your data. 

Beginning in October 2024, single-family residential customers with AMI will receive courtesy email alerts to be made aware of continuous water use, which may indicate a leak. Possible leaks are indicated in orange on your water usage graph. WaterSmart provides a wealth of information about detecting water leaks and using water wisely, including videos on how to detect and repair leaks.

Leak alerts are sent when usage exceeds:

• 5 gallons per hour of continuous use for multiple days.
• 75 gallons per hour for 8 hours. 

Homes without AMI will continue to be alerted of potential leaks shortly after they receive their water bill. To receive monthly alerts, accounts must have a minimum of two years of history associated with the property. 

Billed usage leak alerts are sent when monthly consumption exceeds:  

• 750 Minimum Gallons Per Day (GPD) 
• 200% increase over the seasonal high from the previous two years

You can update the email address associated with your account by adjusting the contact information in your MyCPAU account or by calling Customer Service at (650) 329-2161. You may opt-out at any time by unchecking "Leak Alerts" in Communication Preferences.

Commercial and multi-family residence water usage is compared to your account’s historical water usage.  

Your water usage data, specifically your meter readings, comes directly from your water utility account. WaterSmart and MyCPAU use the same data from meter readings. Historic water usage data goes back to 2017.