Skip to content

‘Lost water,’ broken pipes plague city

BY TRACEY DUGUAY Since last Thursday (Dec. 6), the city has issued five warnings about traffic disruptions or other problems relating to broken water mains.
Watermain290
A major water main break at the Four Corners Thursday tied up traffic all day.

BY TRACEY DUGUAY

Since last Thursday (Dec. 6), the city has issued five warnings about traffic disruptions or other problems relating to broken water mains.

Nick Benkovich, director of water and wastewater services, places the blame on the city’s aging infrastructure, with the average pipe age sitting at around 35 years. He also said another factor is the corrosive soil in the area.

“We were containing it pretty well over the past few years, (the rate of broken water mains) has been coming down substantially,” Benkovich said. “We’ve been trying to do programs to target our weakest areas of the infrastructure and replace or renew those pipes.”

While the final numbers aren’t in yet for 2007, he said water main breaks are sitting in the high 80s so far for this year. In 2006, there were 94; 2005, 120; 2004, 137; 2003, 132; 2002, 94; and 2001, 114.

Two of those breaks – the one in Val Caron in October and on The Kingsway in September  – cost in excess of $50,000 to repair. However, Benkovich characterized these incidents as “major” breaks, and said many other smaller projects fall within the $3,500-$5,000 range.

“The larger the water main the more expensive the repair. Just the parts alone can sometimes be in the tens of thousands of dollars. If it’s a small water main on a residential street, it’s much less expensive to fix.”

Whenever the city tackles these kinds of infrastructure projects, it’s not just the actual pipes that have to be fixed or upgraded. It also has to restore the area back to the previous condition, including roadways, driveways, curbs and sidewalks.

“I don’t have total costs, but it certainly represents a substantial expense for us. We’re budgeted for half a million dollars a year for water main breaks. That’s a real ballpark guess though.”

On the bright side, the new PVC pipes the city now uses have a longer lifespan – about 100 years – compared to the old ductile iron pipes popular in the 1960s and 1970s, which only last about 40 years.

He said they also try to piggy-back on other city projects to save money. If work is going to be done on a road and the pipes underneath it are in need of upgrading, both projects will be done at the same time.

“But all is done with an eye on budget and availability of funds. Recently roads have had access to more funding than we have so despite the fact we’re trying to co-ordinate, it’s subject to the availability of our funding.”

Another area the water and wastewater division is concentrating on its “lost water,” which is also referred to as non-revenue water.

“Non-revenue water is the difference between the production at our water treatment facilities and the water consumed by our customers,” Benkovich said.

Water gets “lost” through a variety of means, mainly leaking pipes, inaccurate or broken meters, and more recently, through water theft that occurs when people deliberately tamper with their meters.

The city has already seen some success in tracking water escaping from leaking pipes. Compared to a few years ago, Benkovich said they’ve decreased this rate from 44 percent to 25 percent.

On Monday night, city council approved the hiring of a full-time meter compliance officer, at a cost of $94,000.

Council is gambling on the fact this new position will eventually pay for itself by resolving some of the lost water issues.

Council was told one inaccurate meter, belonging to a large company, resulted in $120,000 in lost revenue for the city before it was detected.

As well, Benkovich said they’ve also started tracking water theft after an employee noticed an increase in meters that were being tampered with or broken deliberately.

“We investigate those things to determine the cause to make sure our revenue is protected.”

The number of these incidents is still relatively small – 44 accounts out of about 40,000 – but it still makes an impact on the city’s bottom line.

“As water rates climb…some people resort to illegal means,” he said.

Given the fact city council just signed off on a 5.7 percent increase in water and wastewater rates, the number of water thefts may climb even higher in the coming years.


Comments

Verified reader

If you would like to apply to become a verified commenter, please fill out this form.