In the last week or so, each of our territorial authorities (CHBDC, HDC, NCC, WDC) have declared how they would prefer to see water services – drinking water, stormwater, waste water – managed going forward. 

And, pending public consultation about to begin, they will propose a regional approach and entity to handle this responsibility to the Government by September. 

Last week CHBDC said moving in this direction would save its ratepayers at least $20 million over the next ten years alone.

Hopefully a new regional entity will get serious about fixing the leaks that abound in our councils’ current water systems. According to the Hawke’s Bay Regional Water Assessment, we use about 24 million cubic metres of water for reticulation systems serving our households, sportsgrounds, parks and industry. 

As we’ve previously reported (here and here), an estimated 22% of the water flowing through NZ’s municipal systems is wasted via leaks, with Hastings and Napier worse than the national average.

What do they do about it? It’s a drop in the bucket!

We asked our two heaviest water users, HDC and NCC, how much they have budgeted for identifying – just identifying, not fixing – water leaks.

HDC reports $50,000 a year, adding: “We are working with Napier City Council on a possible joint contract for leak detection services from specialist providers as part of formalising our approach and commitment to leak detection. As part of this process we will be ensuring that sufficient budgets are available to support both the detection of and repair of leaks identified.”

NCC reports a slightly more ambitious $60,000!

Hopefully a new regional regime will do better. As they say in business circles, you can’t manage what you don’t measure.

Dams anyone?