Page 253 - Water Loss Control

226 Cha pte r F o u r tee n

The eminent nineteenth century British physicist, Lord Kelvin, provided the follow-
ing quote, which has as much relevance to the field of water loss control as to physics:
If you don’t measure it, you can’t manage it.

A modern corollary of his statement might read:

If we don’t properly define it, measure it, data-warehouse it, and report it, we can’t manage it.
We exist in the information age and the availability and integrity of the information
available to us is of critical importance. A wide variety of information is employed in
the provision of safe drinking water. This information is needed by those working in
the drinking water industry including utility employees, government officials, regula-
tors, service and equipment providers, and external stakeholders such as business and
civic groups, customers, and the news media.
The customer billing system is typically the most significant information warehouse
in most drinking water utilities. Revenue is generated via billings to customers for
water consumption, typically on a monthly or quarterly basis. For utilities that meter
their customers, the billing system stores customer account and meter data, as well as
routine customer meter readings, from which consumption volumes are calculated.
Authorized consumption is any water delivered for consumptive purposes that are
authorized or approved by the water utility, thereby providing a benefit to the commu-
nity. The majority of the aggregate customer consumption volume in a community is
billed authorized consumption, but a small portion is unbilled authorized consumption.
Billed authorized consumption may exist as metered or unmetered consumption
and represents the collective amounts of water delivered to individual customers that
have accounts in a customer billing system. Billed authorized consumption is the pri-
mary basis for revenue generation for most water utilities that don’t charge based upon
flat fees. Billed accounts are customer properties served by permanent customer service
connection piping. In North America, most water utilities require customer meters on
service connections and bill based upon metered consumption on a monthly or quar-
terly basis. Metered water can be categorized as residential, industrial, commercial,
agricultural, governmental, and other uses. Not all water utilities, however, meter their
customers, instead charging a flat billing fee per consumption period, or a charge based
upon property or other characteristics. Therefore billed authorized consumption may
be metered or unmetered. The American Water Works Association (AWWA) recom-
mends that all customers with permanent service connection piping be metered with
billing based upon measured consumption.
Unbilled authorized consumption can also exist as metered or unmetered con-
sumption and describes water taken irregularly in a variety of manners from nonac-
count connections that typically do not supply permanent structures. Withdrawing
water from fire hydrants is the most common example of such nonaccount con-
sumption. Water utilities often allow water to be taken from fire hydrants for fire-
fighting (their primary purpose), flushing, testing, street cleaning, construction, and
other purposes. These uses should be metered to the extent possible, with clear and
explicit usage policies in force to protect water quality and public safety. Sometimes
unbilled water supplied to government properties is also included in this category
although it is recommended that all water continuously supplied to permanent
structures be metered and be tracked in a billed account in the customer billing system.