[Closed] drought - would water pressure be reduced?

You think people might get bored waiting for water to come out of their taps and as a result use less ?

I guess that might work.

Water companies have to provide a certain amount of pressure through the mains or the get fined by the regulator. It's known as DG 2 Director General standard 2.

Companies are required by law to provide water at a pressure that will, under normal circumstances, enable it to reach the top floor of a house. In order to assess whether they satisfy this requirement, companies are required to report against a reference level of ten metres head of pressure, at a flow of nine litres per minute. This should be sufficient to enable a 4.5 litre container (about the size of a small bucket) to be filled within 30 seconds. For ease of measurement, companies adopt a surrogate pressure (usually 15 metres head) in the adjacent water main serving the property.

You're clearly underestimating how stupid people are. If the pressure is lower they won't think about it intelligently and modify their behaviour to use less, they'll modify their behaviour to compensate and probably end up using more.

If the pressure is lower they won't think about it intelligently and modify their behaviour to use less

I would modify my behavior by waiting longer for a bucket to fill up with water. Not the correct behaviour I take it ? Only stupid people would do that ?

Why are you filling a bucket of water up? There's a drought, stupid.

The water companies should be made to stop leaks - that would end the shortage overnight

Why are you filling a bucket of water up?

Because I want to wash my car. It's not illegal you know, stupid.

TandemJeremy - Member
The water companies should be made to stop leaks - that would end the shortage overnight

you need to write to the WICS to express your view that the leakage level of the state owned Scottish Water needs to be improved so they can get the same improvement seen in England and Wales

with the various drought conditions around the UK, water companies reduce the pressure to save resources?

That's exactly the level of stupidity we're talking about. People think a water shortage is someone else's problem. That's exactly what they'd say, it's not illegal so why shouldn't they do it?

.....the state owned Scottish Water needs to be improved so they can get the same improvement seen in England and Wales

My privately owned water company, Thames Water, pisses over 25% of its water into the ground through leakages - the highest in Britain I believe. And the tight-fisted money-grabbing bastards still managed to make over £200 million profit last year.

And were forced to spend £150 million on repairing those leaks.....

Thames Water, pisses over 25% of its water into the ground through leakages - the highest in Britain I believe

blame the local authorities and TfL, if you can't dig the road up you can't improve/ repair the assets

yeah right big and daft. 🙄

And were forced to spend £150 million on repairing those leaks.....

So they spent less in repairing leaks than they made in profit ?

I can't see why they couldn't just make just 50 quid profit and spend another £200 million on fixing leaks.

The hose pipe ban will save 5% water, they lose 5 times more than that through leakage.

for TJ

state owned efficiency?

you can write to them here to express your disgust that Scotland's leakage level is so high

http://www.watercommission.co.uk/view_How%20to%20complain.aspx

or post on Alan Sutherland's Blog here

http://www.watercommission.co.uk/blogs/

They're still a private business who needs to make a profit to continue to exist. Without shareholder returns they will lose investors and begin a spiral that could end fatally. Hosepipe bans are created because the water used for hosepipes is typically non-essential and it costs little to implement. Repairing leaks is hugely expensive and time consuming.

All water companies are monitored for leakage and the results every year have significant effect on how much profit they can make and how much they have to spend on making things better. No other private business in the country is controlled so tightly by the government in this way.

The hose pipe ban will save 5% water, they lose 5 times more than that through leakage

you will never have zero leakage, it's essentially impossible.

compulsory metering of all customers and seasonal tariffs is as essential as reducing leakage levels

so that's a no then?

in response to OP. Yes, pressure could be reduced. As mentioned above there is a minium required pressure but generally water pressure is higher than this at customer taps.

And if you think the solution to the problem is simply reducing leakage, you are looking at this in far to simple a fashion. That is one aspect of the whole issue. You could have 0 leakage, but as a customer you would need to pay more to acheive this, as surpsingly it costs a lot of money to dig holes in roads and replace pipes.

[i]The water companies should be made to stop leaks - that would end the shortage overnight [/i]

They are, it wouldn't, and that's not the point.

Common sense, reason and a greater understanding of the subject have no place in a disagreement with TJ and Ernie. Not when they can stick it to the man! 😐

If things got that bad then they'd have stand pipes in the street or tanker in water as they did in 1976. During the Yorkshire drought of the 1990s things were so bad that large scale evacuations were considered, but given the disruption involved, bringing water to the people rather than people to the water was found to be the most logical solution.

Having been through the aftermath of the Gloucestershire floods in 2007, it's amazing how quickly you adapt to there being [b]no[/b] water out ofthe taps. The logistics operation by Severn Trent and the Army was incredible and must have cost a fortune though.

Severn Trent and the [s]Army[/s] [b]Armed Forces[/b]

FTFY 😀

No I still piss like a race horse

TooTall - fair enough, I did wonder. Good work by all of 'em 🙂

If things got that bad then they'd have stand pipes in the street or tanker in water as they did in 1976

that is an idea, but unlikely to actually happen. can you imagine people watining patiently for water like back then? Not really a practical option any more.

Well the provison of bottled water in the 2007 floods seemed for the most part to go well...

so stopping the 25% of water that is lost thru leaks would make no difference? yeah right.

They are being forced to repair them? - yes gentle pressure that they are kicking and screaming from under.

The 200 million profit should have been used to stop leaks. The governments should force them to do so. They have enough water - they just waste 1/4 of it.

[i]can you imagine people watining patiently for water like back then? Not really a practical option any more[/i]

Like ohnohesback said, yes I can, 'cos I've seen it in action.

I'm not saying it wouldn't make any difference, of course it would.

And they are mandated to reduce leakage. Maybe greater pressure should be applied, but iof they didn't make any profit, they would have no investors, so there'd be less money to fix leaks...

The point is that blaming the water companies will not fill the reservoirs. There is not a lot of water so it's everyone's responsibility to use what there is responsibly.

Reducing the leakage down to 0% would probably triple your water rates and make driving in any city impossible for the next 5 or 6 years.

[i] They have enough water - they just waste 1/4 of it.[/i]

I think they don't though TJ, it hasn't really rained properly for a couple of years now down south, I guess the water companies should/could repair stuff, but it's also true that it's wrong to use drinking water for washing your car.

And they are mandated to reduce leakage. Maybe greater pressure should be applied, but iof they didn't make any profit, they would have no investors, so there'd be less money to fix leaks...

The money comes from the consumers. The shareholders take money out not put it in

Billions of pounds in profits removed from the system. Just imagine if that all went into repairs?

Or water storage...

Cue all the people who crow when it's sunny in London demanding that the water in the North West be delivered to them.

As someone recently said, if they want the water, they can have the clouds as well.

Or the damp North could have the unsustainable urbanisation planned for the parched South-East...

My privately owned water company, Thames Water, pisses over 25% of its water into the ground through leakages

Where it goes back to where they got it from in the first place anyway....

so stopping the 25% of water that is lost thru leaks would make no difference? yeah right.

They are being forced to repair them? - yes gentle pressure that they are kicking and screaming from under.

The 200 million profit should have been used to stop leaks. The governments should force them to do so. They have enough water - they just waste 1/4 of it.

Do you have a figure to hand for what it would cost to fix every leak in the TW region? I'd hazzard a guess it's a f***load more than £200million. So either bills have to go up (which they're not allowed to do), or profits go down (which they were forced to do).

As for shareholders only taking money out of the system........

If there was no profit, there would be no shareholders, if there were no shareholders the company would be esentialy worthless, if it's worthless then it can't borrow money from the bank as it has no asset to borrow against (because you've deemed it's asset worthless as its not profitable).

Bessides, £200million isn't a big profit, there's ~9million households in the TW region, so let's say a nice round 20million people. £10 of the south easts water bill was profit, hardly extortion is it?

Or the damp North could have the unsustainable urbanisation planned for the parched South-East...

North West second most densely populated region after the South East.

TandemJeremy - Member
so stopping the 25% of water that is lost thru leaks would make no difference? yeah right.

They are being forced to repair them? - yes gentle pressure that they are kicking and screaming from under.

The 200 million profit should have been used to stop leaks. The governments should force them to do so. They have enough water - they just waste 1/4 of it.

Again this is somewhat naive. The profit is returned to investment as regulated by OFWAT. Leakage is not the only thing that requires investment. Ageing water treatment plant requires investment, sewerage networks require investmenr, sewerage treatment requires investment etc etc.

These large (and small) engineering projects all cost large amounts of money.

I think the pressure should be lower anyway; surely it would save energy and stop some of the leaks.

Also I dont see why we need to bath/shower/wash the car or bike/water the garden etc with drinking standard water.

I don't know how much sort of micro-topographical control they have over water pressure though. I think in nearest village to me there must be a 50m height change in about 500m of horizontal distance, and what seems like low water pressure at the top of the hill, might seem really high at the bottom.

Ageing water treatment plant requires investment, sewerage networks require investmenr, sewerage treatment requires investment etc etc.

These large (and small) engineering projects all cost large amounts of money.

yes - and they "investors" take money out as profits, they don't put any in. If they didn't take profits there would be more money to repair the leaks with

yeh i think that delivered water pressure is determined by head and not pressurisation vessels and is thus at east partly determined by elevation.

ergo it's not necessarily something they can just 'turn down'

[i]they don't put any in[/i]

If you buy shares, you put money in.

[i]I don't know how much sort of micro-topographical control they have over water pressure though. I think in nearest village to me there must be a 50m height change in about 500m of horizontal distance, and what seems like low water pressure at the top of the hill, might seem really high at the bottom. [/i]

This. Certainly in hilly places an awful lot of the pressure is achieved from gravity. The service reservoirs tend to be as high as possible to avoid having to pump.

Samuri - the infrastructure was already there - the money they paid for shares went into the governments coffers.

They take out money now - in the form of profits. tehy do not put any in.

Pressure won't get turned down, you'd have to go out to thousands and thousands of little booster stations all over the region and manually adjust the pumps, half of which are fixed speed anyway so cant be fiddled with. That would be a huuuge job and the operations staff are stretched to the limit as it is anyway. Plus the network modelling required to check which areas have any spare capacity anyway would be massive.

Fixing leaks is obviously important but it's not an overnight fix, whereas limiting peoples usage (hosepipe ban) is.

1976 and all that...

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-17100033

Well again, ignoring Scotland, the money that I pay right now for shares in a water company, goes to that water company. But that's nothing compared to the Billions that a large water company will take in revenue. The huge turnover that all water companies operate gives a good indication of how enormously expensive it is to supply water and take poo away never mind repair those systems.

TandemJeremy - Member
Samuri - the infrastructure was already there - the money they paid for shares went into the governments coffers.

chamley - Member
Pressure won't get turned down, you'd have to go out to thousands and thousands of little booster stations all over the region and manually adjust the pumps, half of which are fixed speed anyway so cant be fiddled with. That would be a huuuge job and the operations staff are stretched to the limit as it is anyway. Plus the network modelling required to check which areas have any spare capacity anyway would be massive.

I think what this thread does highlight is the general misunderstanding by the public of how complex and difficult it actually is to turn raw water into something that meets drinking water regulations.

It also highlights a few water company employees lurking on STW 😉

Yup, quite a few of us water industry (companies, regulators, supply chain) folk on here. Some of us have even been on all three sides of the fence 😉 and have seen it from different perspectives. Believe it or not, one of our parish (not me!) is actually probably one of the best people in the UK to really know where things are at with Thames Water's supply/demand situation...

Not really a subject that can be fully discussed on an internet forum but it's reassuring to see that the full spectrum of societal opinion is represented on here, albeit with the more rational views seeming to prevail over the Daily Wail-style rants 😀

In response to the OP - companies can and do use pressure management as one form of leakage control, while (as others have said) being subject to delivering a minimum standard of service (DG2) in the pressure at the customer's tap.

oops i meant 1989 for privatisation 😳

Yup, quite a few of us water industry (companies, regulators, supply chain) folk on here

edit: obviously on dirty bikes that have not been washed by hosepipe 😉

Yawn. The infrastructure was there in 1991 when the companies were privatised. Obviously this is all magic stuff that doesnt age or wear or need replacing or upgrading as the population grows

yes - but the shareholders have not put in more money since have they? they simply take money out in profits. Any investment comes from revenue does it not? or are they really issuing new share capital IE putting in more money of their own?

And I still maintain that since most people are already unattractive, they have little to gain from washing themselves in clean water so they could save money and help the drought situation by collecting water in a butt and rinsing themselves down once a week from that.

[i]edit: obviously on dirty bikes that have not been washed by hosepipe [/i]

I can use a hosepipe, our reservoirs are nice and full. 😉

yes - but the shareholders have not put in more money since have they? they simply take money out in profits. Any investment comes from revenue does it not? or are they really issuing new share capital IE putting in more money of their own?

The water companies have substantially reduced leakage in the last few years - Thames Water down by a quarter IIRC. Regardless of your or my views on privatisation, money has been invested. A lot of money.

NO it hasn't ransos - they have not put in more money from outside. they have used revenue to build more stuff and taken a part of the revenue out of the system as profit

Excellent idea, matthewlhome 🙂 I reckon Cannock is the best bet travelwise if it was to involve as many companies as possible.

[slight hijack] I've been looking to put together a WaterAid industry event for a couple of years, say a 12 hour relay with mixed teams of companies/regulators/supply chain, to get some rapport going between the various 'tribes' (having worked in all three, I know this is would be useful!).

Venue is my biggest headache! Insurance, liability etc. I'm thinking some of Welsh Water's Elan Valley catchment would be good. Or maybe Yorkshire Water's Langsett area. Choices...

I'm also working with some other people to pull together an overall umbrella (no pun intended!) within which any cycling activities in support of WaterAid can fit and which would act as some sort of 'hub' for information / resources. Should be launching soon. [slight hijack over, apologies]

Go on TJ, show us your sources for the proof that there's been no investment brought in.

Thames Water, pisses over 25% of its water into the ground through leakages

As for leaks it is amazing how many have them outside of their house but do not report them. The problem is that everyone thinks someone else will do it.

yes - but the shareholders have not put in more money since have they? they simply take money out in profits. Any investment comes from revenue does it not? or are they really issuing new share capital IE putting in more money of their own?

Matthew - my point simply is that they could do more to stop the leaks but take profits out instead. while they are leaking that much every penny possible should be invested in stopping leaks - not taking billions out of the system in profits.

Keep us in the loop then drain. We already do cycling events for WaterAid and similar with director level involvement so I'm sure we could generate a lot of interest here.

I'll let you use my Lake District if you want. Remember to leave it how you found it though.

Matthew - my point simply is that they could do more to stop the leaks but take profits out instead.

The leakage target is set by the regulator.

yes - but the shareholders have not put in more money since have they? they simply take money out in profits. Any investment comes from revenue does it not? or are they really issuing new share capital IE putting in more money of their own?

Don't let the facts get in the way

All the water companies have a debt and equity mix for their financing except for Scotland, Welsh, and NI.

The profits (which are regulated) pay dividends which are the returns for the equity investors. Interest on debt is hidden and the level of gearing regulated by Ofwat, which is why a simplistic analysis of the financing is misleading.

I suppose you would be happier with the £40 billion invested being public debt. Just wait for your rates bill to start going up with Scotlands massive investment gap.

I assume that you're talking about nationalistic Scottish water suppliers TJ as Thames Water is spending multi millions a year upgrading the Victorian infrastructure in west London.

NO it hasn't ransos - they have not put in more money from outside. they have used revenue to build more stuff and taken a part of the revenue out of the system as profit

Who said anything about bringing in money from outside? Revenues that would otherwise be profit have been spent on infrastructure.

So they haven't atualy brought in any new investment then? merely taken out potential investment as profits.

aP - Member

I assume that you're talking about nationalistic Scottish water suppliers TJ as Thames Water is spending multi millions a year upgrading the Victorian infrastructure in west London

If you have a problem with how they use their money then how about complaining to those who deal with these issues - http://www.ofwat.gov.uk/

@samuri - ta muchly! Not a gel wrapper will remain... 😉 I'll drop you a line if that's ok.

I was very impressed with the UU team JOGLE (or was it LEJOG?) relay last year. Welsh has their annual Tour de Taff (in which their MD usually wups everyone, he's a bit good!). Yorkshire has its second annual coast-coast lined up and it's a successful (oversubscribed!) format. I know the EA have done similar things.

So it all looks to have a lot of potential. Probably worth a separate thread - apologies OP 😳

@TJ - this might help with some background as to why revenue is not the only (or even main) source of investment. [url= http://www.water.org.uk/home/policy/positions/finance-and-investment ]finance_investment[/url] If profit levels aren't sufficiently attractive, capital costs more (and there would be less put in by investors), so bills would go up.

Obviously this doesn't apply where you are in Scotland though, where Scottish Water gets its money at the same cost of capital as the government (but pays the price of being at the whim of political expediency, and which is even more apparent in how Northern Ireland Water is a political football).

TJ you haven't answered my question. Where's your proof?

So they haven't atualy brought in any new investment then? merely taken out potential investment as profits.

They're private companies. By (amongst other things) paying dividends to shareholders, they are able to attract investment not available to a publicly-owned company. The corollary is that they need to make a profit in order to give those shareholders a return on their investment.

I'm not in favour of privately-owned monopolies any more than you are, but to assert that these companies haven't invested in infrastructure is demonstrably false.

Its very simple. They have not brought more money in to the system. they have taken money out of it. finance is more expensive to a commercial company rather than a government agency.

so you get less twice - once in more expensive debt and then again as they take their profits out.

200 million a year taken out in profit by Thames water. thats more than they spend on fixing pipes is it not?

its not like this is a new issue is it? its been going on for decades. How much money has been taken out in profits since privatisation?

Its very simple. They have not brought more money in to the system. they have taken money out of it. finance is more expensive to a commercial company rather than a government agency.

Yet leakage rates are far lower now than they were 20 years ago. What does that tell you?

To clarify my previous post: leakage rates are far lower in England & Wales, at 22%. Scottish water is much less impressive at 38%.

Come on TJ, the nasty private English water companies with their awful profits have invested more in infrastructure than the Scotch ones. Where's your proof that profit has limited investment and why are the Scotch ones not doing so?

There's an important difference between making a profit of £200 million and taking £200 million 'out as a profit'.

Some of the profit will be 'taken out' in the form of dividend payments, but the majority will be ploughed back into infrastructure improvements.

Unfortunately TJ, the real-world funding models of major utilities are not as simplistic as they would be in your utopian socialist idyll.

yeh i think that delivered water pressure is determined by head and not pressurisation vessels and is thus at east partly determined by elevation.

ergo it's not necessarily something they can just 'turn down'

So yes, they could reduce the water pressure in most places, but maybe not in hilly gravity fed areas - but most of them don't have a shortage!

How low they can go? I don't know the answer to that.