Leakage

We aim to keep leakage at or below the recognised ‘economic level’ – the point at which the cost of fixing leaks outweighs the benefits. Reducing leakage is also a priority for our customers.

What is our current level of leakage?

We have an extensive network of more than 11,500m mains and service pipes.

Controlling leakage from our network remains one of our highest priorities to ensure we can meet current and future demand in a financially, socially and environmentally sustainable way.

During 2009-10 we continued to tackle leakage, now at 74Ml/d, in line with our economic level of leakage target. We were pleased to achieve this despite the impact of the cold sustained weather and snowmelt in early 2010 which caused excessive ground movement and damage to pipework.

Our success in dealing with leakage this year was thanks to our experienced and dedicated leakage technicians and repair teams who carried out intensive detection and repair activity throughout the winter months. Our staff worked in difficult conditions that made it hard to access areas and find the bursts and once there to minimise the loss of water from our network.

How else are we tackling it?

We are continuing to use innovative technology to try and reduce our leakage.

This includes a new system for targeting leakage resources using flow data analysis within each of our supply zones.

We also continued to invest in pressure management technology, by installing specialist data loggers that measure water pressure at certain points in our supply network.

During the year we fitted 250 loggers to our mains which has helped us make considerable leakage savings, as well as providing real time data on how our assets and network perform.

The loggers were often installed on areas prone to bursts to help act as an early warning systems for bursts, detect leaks and identify any problems in pressure. This information also helped meet target water pressure requirements, avoiding very low pressure for customers.