Water conservation is still one of the most problematic challenges in natural resources, and the more that global warming and climate change is felt in different areas across the globe, the more evident it becomes that better technology and/or services for improving water management and consumption are required.
To this end, England is basically launching an experiment to ascertain whether it can get individuals to use water more wisely. This is in the form of the deregulation of water and wastewater services, allowing consumers and businesses to the opportunity to purchase these from qualifying providers as of 2017, instead of being forced to use their local municipal utility.
The overall idea is that, as with electricity, healthy competition will encourage new business models and innovative ideas that will increase profits for providers while also lowering prices for consumers.
The World Bank Estimates that around 8.6 trillion gallons of water is lost annually due to leaks, and it is hoped that efficient fixtures, leak monitoring and Big Data by new providers will make a he dent in these water losses.
An immense amount of energy is expended on pumping water, and this typically counts for around 33% of the operating expenses of a municipal water agency. Not having this huge expenditure would free up a huge chunk of municipal funding for other projects, and water companies have better technology that will allow them to leverage data to lower peak prices or to balance reservoir levels to prevent storm overflows.
A similar concept that has been running in Scotland since 2008 shows that this move by England has promise, as the Scottish programme has yielded more than £35 million in efficiency savings and customer satisfaction is up by 26%.
Only time will tell whether deregulation will work or not – deregulation of electricity is making customers gravitate to new providers, although they still need to learn to shop and switch more as more than 50% are overpaying by failing to do so. Hopefully they will learn to do so more with the new water providers.
Will the U.K.’s proposed deregulation cut water consumption? Who knows? Only time will tell as it will take several years to evaluate the results.
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