Nowe wymagania w zakresie jakości usług wodociągowych dotyczące strat wody

Abstract

Objective: Directive 2020 / 2184 on the quality of drinking water and the European Green Deal introduce new requirements for assessing the quality of water services and the need to reduce water leakage. The main purpose of the article is to compare the methods of determining water losses used in Poland with international standards and to determine the readiness of Polish water supply systems to implement mandatory leakage estimation standards.Research Design & Methods: The article presents a review of the literature on water loss assessment methods in Poland and abroad. Data on water losses in 11 water supply systems were presented, based on the information from the Central Statistical Office and the literature. Based on the data, a comparative analysis of selected entities was carried out.Findings: With a ranking of water utilities created, the impact of input data and the adopted calculation methodology on the position of a given entity in the ranking were analysed. The assumptions made for the calculation of the indicators and the choice of the evaluation method are shown to be important in the assessment of the entities.Implications / Recommendations: Comparing the scope of data collected at the national level and the requirements for international standards, it can be concluded that in Poland these data are not sufficient to calculate the value of the ILI (Infrastructure Leakage Index). The ILI is known in Poland, but its application is limited to the local level. The introduction of new requirements for the calculation of ILI at the national level will require the implementation of methods for collecting large amounts of data from many water utilities.Contribution: Due to the important role water utilities play, the level of infrastructure maintenance in supply systems must be constantly controlled. One of the basic indicators for assessing the condition of the water supply network is water loss. The conclusion from the article can be used by water operators to better evaluate their systems. The results of the analysis indicate the need for further research and the development of new methods of assessing water supply systems. The research contributes to the development of several scientific disciplines: environmental engineering, mining and energy management and quality studies.