What drought, water water everywhere....

Water water everywhere and loads to spare!


The Guardian & The Observer Digital Editions


I'm sure there's a better way but click on the Forget about leaks..... for an enlargement!!

I agree Fred.

when you see how much water is lost thru leaks the companies ought to be fined

Lord Paul of Sheffield said:

when you see how much water is lost thru leaks the companies ought to be fined

Click to expand...

Yes, but then the leakage goes back into the groundwater table, so its never really 'lost' just sort of 'misplaced' for a while LOL

I've been checking with my daughter almost daily and it appears that Salisbury have been deluged this week and most of last week too . . . . . . I'm glad my house is about 14 feet above the river, or it was when I left last Wednesday.

Peter Jacobs said:

Yes, but then the leakage goes back into the groundwater table, so its never really 'lost' just sort of 'misplaced' for a while LOL

I've been checking with my daughter almost daily and it appears that Salisbury have been deluged this week and most of last week too . . . . . . I'm glad my house is about 14 feet above the river, or it was when I left last Wednesday.

Click to expand...

Peter, admittedly much leakage water will find it's way back to the groundwater table but surely this is water that has already been treated as suitable for drinking, etc. at some cost which would be reflected in our water bills?
Jerry

Peter Jacobs said:

Yes, but then the leakage goes back into the groundwater table

Click to expand...

Not sure that is the case, more likely to end up in road drains and add to surface water run-off in an urban area - unless the leak is over chalk

The water companies have already charged customers for the water which leaks out of the pipes & when Ofwat have ordered the water companies to reduce their leakage rates by only 1.5% by 2015 the whole setup stinks.
There is no real water shortage just waste by the water companies who usually have to pump from rivers to fill their raw water storage reservoirs which in turn drags down water levels in the main rivers and all their tributaries.
Where I live,Ofwat have deemed it is OK to waste 60 million litres per day from the water supply network,every day all year long - disgraceful is an understatement.

I heard the other day that this is the 'wrong type of rain' and it fails to penetrate down to the aquafir because of the hardened ground.......

Trouble is until the ground is made wet then it will remain hard, so I am not really sure what the right kind of rain really is, or is it just media doom-mongers spouting twaddle on days when they are short of news?

Pete Shears said:

Where I live,Ofwat have deemed it is OK to waste 60 million litres per day from the water supply network,every day all year long

Click to expand...

To give you an idea of what 60 million litres is, that's just 4 MINUTES of typical low summer in the middle Thames. So if you stand and watch the Thames for just 4 minutes, that's how much water is being wasted everyday. In typical winter flow after heavy rain, it's just one minute, but you really have to see it and try to imagine all that water seeping through old pipework.

On the other side of the coin, London had some of the earliest freshwater delivery systems in the world and it's a lot of that pipework that is leaking so badly today. If they decided, if they had the labour force and the money, to start replacing the whole lot tomorrow London would be out of bounds for any traffic for about three years and that would kybosh the Olympics for a start. Businesses would go under left, right and centre and hundreds of thousands of workers would lose their jobs (unless they were plumbers of course).


Irish plumber looking at Niagara falls. After 20 minutes he says to his wife "I can fix this!"

---------- Post added at 22:21 ---------- Previous post was at 22:19 ----------

terry m said:

I heard the other day that this is the 'wrong type of rain' and it fails to penetrate down to the aquafir because of the hardened ground.......

Click to expand...

I have been digging postholes for our new fence and two feet down the clay, after 18 months of drought, is like digging up a bread pudding it is so wet. The holes are filling with water as we're pouring in the concrete. It's wetter than people think.

I similarly to Jeff was digging the garden and the soil was wet up to a foot down. I think the ground generally is fairly saturated by now and I heard on the news the other day the base ground water levels are rising now. With people drowning in the drought I would have thought the ban could be lifted now for a spell and see what happens. The rain doesn't look like letting up for a while so, it all looks rosy.

victorian water mains, victorian sewers, leaking and not good enough for the 21st century
its a good job the hundreds if not thousands of other european cities, didn't get sanitation and water supply at the same time as us, otherwise they'd 'ave the same problems

this simple incentive would encourage water companies to up their game;
I'll use simple figures as an example

the average persons consumption is 1 litre per year
the average persons bill is £1.00 per year
therefore the average cost is £1.00 per year for 1 litres consumption

if the water companies lose 10 litres per year, then they should pay for the use/loss/consumption of that water, at the average cost, in this case £10.00

and while we're at it apply the same maths to thames waters continual pollution of the thames, in a bad year its up to 96 biliion litres of untreated sewage and storm water

It's not going away, despite the present floods and shower/deluge-dodging. Interesting Costing The Earth programme on BBC Radio 4 here - BBC - BBC Radio 4 Programmes - Costing the Earth, Pushing Water