Latest news with #waterleakage
Times
2 hours ago
- Climate
- Times
Can satellites help these leaky pipe hunters end hosepipe bans?
If you spotted Paul Telford and Giles Surman out of your front window, you might wonder what on earth they were doing. Marching from house to house, they pause outside each one, jab a long metal stick at the ground, and press an ear to its top, as though listening to the pavement. Peculiar though this routine may seem, you should be thankful they perform it, because without it your taps might run dry. Telford and Surman are leakage technicians for Northumbrian Water. They spend their days lifting the small black lids that punctuate the pavement, and listen for the hiss of a leak from the pipes beneath. 'Sometimes we open up hundreds of boxes before finding a leak,' Telford said. 'It's pretty boring. Nah, it's not actually, because when you find a leak it's good.' 'Most important thing, isn't it, water?' Surman added. 'It's all right on a sunny day like today,' Telford said. 'But in the wind and rain, we're still out looking for them. The rain interferes with your listening.' Most of the leaks they find spray out about a litre a second, which might not sound like much until you consider that there are 86,400 seconds in a day. On an average day three billion litres of water are lost this way in Britain — one in every five pumped into the water network. It is partly thanks to leakage that water companies have had to impose hosepipe bans on nearly nine million customers this summer to stop reservoirs falling perilously low. This problem has always dogged water companies. The efforts of technicians such as Telford and Surman have managed to reduce it by 41 per cent since 1989. But with Britain having just endured its driest spring on record and with climate change threatening to make summers more arid, the pressure is on to reduce it further. The Environment Agency has warned that unless water companies halve leakage, build more reservoirs and encourage their customers to use less water, England will face a shortage of five billion litres a day by 2055. • UK set for third heatwave but drought is more concerning So Telford and Surman are in a race against time. It's fortunate, then, that technology is helping them speed up. Northumbrian Water has partnered with a Newcastle-based start-up, Origin Tech, which has worked out how to spot leaks via satellite. Origin's analysts have noticed that when satellites project radar signals at wet ground, the signals bounce back at a different amplitude than they would from dry ground, giving a clue as to where pipes may be leaking. They have also noticed that land around leaky pipes is more likely to subside and be heavily vegetated. Combining all these clues, their AI model can spot a leak with 80 per cent accuracy. With the tech company's help, Telford and Surman no longer have to traipse about entire housing estates. They can narrow down the location of a leak to a 20m radius. 'It saves you walking five or six miles,' Telford said. Origin claims that without its technology, leakage technicians spot about one leak a day, and with it, they spot four or five. 'The satellite's pretty good, like,' Telford said. 'You find leaks at the majority of points it's spotted. You get the odd one where I don't know what it's picked up. But it's a lot quicker.' The Origin team has also worked out how to fix leaks without digging up the road, saving a great deal of time, expense and motorists' annoyance. They do so by filling the leaky pipes with a grey goo made from calcium carbonate. As the goo leaks out of the pipe, the calcium carbonate particles get stuck in the hole, sealing it up. The goo is then pumped back out, leaving the pipe watertight. Working also with water companies including Thames, Affinity, Yorkshire and the Pennon Group, which owns South West Water, Origin has used satellites to spot leaks spouting 20 million litres a day and used its no-dig technology to fix 10,000 pipes, saving 100 million litres a day. John Marsden, the company's founding director, said: 'Those numbers are mainly just from doing trials with water companies. We can easily double or triple those numbers as we scale up. So I think we'll make an impact. 'Most of the leaks we find are the ones that are really hard to find. We're not going to find all the leaks but there are still lots of low-hanging fruit.' Jeremy Heath, the zero leakage project lead at UK Water Industry Research, said that as Britain attempted to save water in the face of climate change, new technologies to find and fix leaks would be 'really useful'. He said: 'Halving leakage is going to be really tricky to do. Places like Tokyo, Singapore and Holland have achieved really low leakage, but they've done that by replacing their entire pipe network. We could do that but it would be really expensive. 'So solutions like Origin's that allow us to carry out the repairs quickly and without having to dig up the road are really, really useful indeed.' Heath added that researchers at the University of Sheffield had developed another promising techno-fix: robots the size of toy cars that can crawl through pipes to spot the exact location of a leak. Thames Water, Wessex Water and Welsh Water are partnering with them.
The Independent
4 days ago
- Business
- The Independent
Water companies enforcing hosepipe bans leak over one billion litres of water a day
The four water companies with hosepipe bans currently in effect in the UK are leaking over one billion litres of water a day, new analysis has revealed. Thames Water, Yorkshire Water, Southern Water and South East Water have been criticised for enforcing the bans in the wake of water shortages while leaking massive amounts of water every day. The 1.031 billion litres of water leaked daily in 2024/25 was enough to fill 400 Olympic swimming pools, the figures from the companies' recent annual performance reports show. Bringing attention to the issue, the Liberal Democrats called it a 'scandal,' especially in light of the 'eye-watering' salary and bonuses given to water bosses despite ongoing sector-wide issues. They pointed to the chief executive of Southern Water Lawrence Gosden's pay package rising to £975k in 2024/25, an increase of 35 per cent. Of all the water companies operating in the UK, Thames Water leaked the most in 2024/25, at 569.1 mega litres a day (ML/d). This was down slightly from 570.4 ML/d, but still keeps the London water supplier in the top spot. According to most recent figures, Yorkshire water is leaking 260.2 ML/d, Southern Water 97.7 and South East Water 104.8. Recent analysis by The Independent found that no household has been fined for breaking hosepipe bans over the last five years, calling into question how seriously water companies are taking water-saving measures. Regulator Ofwat says that around a fifth of water running through pipes is still lost to leakage, although this amount has been cut by 41 per cent since 1989, when water companies were privatised. Officially, leakage is water that companies cannot account for; it has entered their systems but not been delivered to homes or businesses used in their operations. It can be driven by factors like the condition of pipes or companies' operational strategies, such as how they manage water pressure. Commenting, Liberal Democrat Environment Spokesperson Tim Farron MP said: 'It is an absolute scandal that families are being told to limit their water use this summer, while these failing water firms are letting over a billion litres a day go to waste through leaky pipes.' A Thames Water spokesperson said: 'Leakage is at its lowest ever level on our network, down 13.2% since 2020, but we know we have more work to do. The extended warm weather also brings increased risks of leaks and bursts due to pipe stress and shifting foundations in the ground.' A Southern Water spokesperson said: 'Last year, we reduced leakage by almost 20% and are seeking the same cut this year, saving 17 million litres more water every day - enough to serve 35,000 customers.' A Yorkshire Water spokesperson said: "We understand how frustrating leaks are for our customers and would like to assure them that reducing leakage on our networks is a priority for us. Leakage is the lowest it has ever been in Yorkshire, and it's something that we work on all year round.' A Water UK spokesperson said:'Water companies are doing everything they can to prevent further restrictions. Leakage is currently at the lowest level on record, with reductions every year since 2020, and will be cut by a further 17% by 2030. 'However, after one of the driest springs on record, recent heatwaves and more dry weather forecast, we're asking everyone to use water wisely and cut back where they can.'
