Controlling Water Losses in Distribution

In Controlling Water Losses in Distribution, you'll learn ...

• Program components for water loss control: Water Audit, Intervention, and Evaluation
• Performance indicators and benchmarks
• Economic considerations for real loss control
• Metering: types and location

Overview

Credit: 8 PDH

Length: 97 pages

Culverts are hydraulically short conduits that convey stream flow through a roadway embankment or past some other type of flow obstruction. Like bridges, culverts are an important part of the transportation infrastructure in the United States because they allow rivers and streams to pass beneath roads and railways. Unfortunately, culverts decay due to the processes of abrasion, corrosion and erosion, shortening the anticipated service life of the facility. Maintaining system infrastructure to deliver clean and safe drinking water to customers is often a significant challenge for the operators of public water systems (PWSs). Much of the estimated 880,000 miles of drinking water infrastructure in the United States has been in service for decades and can be a significant source of water loss. In addition to physical loss of water from the distribution system, "losses" can occur through unauthorized consumption (theft), administrative errors, data handling errors, and metering inaccuracies or failure. Water is a commodity that is produced by a PWS; therefore, lost or unaccounted-for water can be equated to lost or unaccounted-for revenue. A water loss control program can help to locate and reduce these water losses and thus maintain or increase revenue.

A PWS must balance use of its resources to address the financial and personnel demands of economic restrictions, water availability, population and climate changes, regulatory requirements, operational costs, and public and environmental stewardship. A water loss control program can help identify and reduce actual water losses along with apparent losses resulting from metering, billing or accounting errors. Water loss control programs can potentially defer, reduce, or eliminate the need for a facility to expend resources on costly repairs, upgrades, or expansions. A water loss control program will also protect public health through reduction in potential entry points of disease-causing pathogens.

This course is intended for civil or environmental engineers involved with construction, repair, maintenance, or operation of public water systems.