Analysis of water pricing in Ireland and recommendations towards a more efficient water sector

Water Policy ◽  
2013 ◽  
Vol 15 (3) ◽  
pp. 435-457 ◽  
Author(s):  
J. Brady ◽  
N. F. Gray
Keyword(s):  
Water Supply ◽  
Water Pricing ◽  
Water Sector ◽  
The Public ◽  
Public Supply ◽  
Revenue Collection ◽  
Water Charges ◽  
Group Water ◽  
Water And Wastewater ◽  
Unaccounted For Water

Within Ireland, both the public water supply and group water scheme (GWS) sectors are crucial entities in the provision of water supply to individuals. In this study, variances in water charges and operation are assessed via an in-depth survey of 104 GWSs in order to establish the range in both domestic and commercial charges, and also to establish the factors influencing these charges within the rural water sector. Results are compared with the commercial water charges of the 34 local authorities involved in the provision of public water and wastewater services. Devoid of regulation, tariff setting is highly decentralised with substantial variations in connection, fixed and volumetric charges across both sectors. Greater transparency is essential to establish the full cost of supply to domestic and non-domestic consumers. Findings reveal average GWS volumetric charges to be 35% lower than public supplies, resulting in communities wishing to retain ownership of their schemes as there is much greater control over water pricing. Historic underinvestment has led to an infrastructure deficit and deficiencies within the public supply sector are discussed, such as inadequate revenue collection and high unaccounted-for water. Furthermore, recommendations are made towards effective operation and pricing in light of proposed government plans to establish a national water authority.

The use of road transport in the systems of group water supply and wastewater disposal

2021 ◽  
pp. 57-64
Author(s):  
Р.В. Чупин ◽  
М.В. Мороз
Keyword(s):  
Wastewater Treatment ◽  
Water Supply ◽  
Road Transport ◽  
Financial Resources ◽  
Wastewater Disposal ◽  
Technical And Economic Analysis ◽  
Group Water ◽  
Treatment Facilities ◽  
Water And Wastewater ◽  
Design Options

Из-за неравномерности распределения водных ресурсов по территории России многие населенные пункты и даже города не имеют своих источников водоснабжения и водоемов, куда можно было бы сбрасывать очищенные сточные воды. Для решения этой проблемы проектируются, строятся и развиваются групповые и районные системы водоснабжения и водоотведения. Протяженность таких систем насчитывает сотни и даже тысячи километров. На их строительство и эксплуатацию ежегодно требуются значительные финансовые средства. Поэтому вопросы выбора трасс, состава сооружений и особенно способов транспортировки воды и сточных вод, обоснования мест расположения водозаборов и очистных сооружений являются актуальными и требуют особого внимания и технико-экономического анализа проектных вариантов. Предлагается методика комплексной оптимизации параметров систем водоснабжения и водоотведения, позволяющая определять наилучшие способы транспортирования воды и стоков (трубопроводами либо в цистернах автомобилей), места устройства водозаборов, водопроводных и канализационных очистных сооружений, оптимальные трубопроводные трассы и автомобильные маршруты между этими сооружениями и абонентами. Due to the uneven distribution of water resources across the territory of Russia, many communities and even cities lack own water supply sources and water bodies where effluents could be discharge into. To address this problem, group and district water supply and wastewater disposal systems are designed, built and developed. The length of such systems is hundreds and even thousands of kilometers. Significant financial resources are required annually for their construction and operation. Therefore, the issues of the choice of routes, composition of the structures and especially methods of transporting water and wastewater, justification of locating water intakes and treatment facilities are relevant and require special attention and technical and economic analysis of design options. A method is proposed for the comprehensive optimization of the parameters of water supply and wastewater disposal systems that will provide for determining the best ways of transporting water and wastewater (by pipelines or in road-tankers), location of water intakes, water supply and wastewater treatment facilities, optimal pipeline routes and auto routes between these structures and customers.

Pipes and politics: a century of change and continuity in Kenyan urban water supply

2008 ◽  
Vol 46 (1) ◽  
pp. 133-158 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Nilsson ◽  
Ezekiel Nyangeri Nyanchaga
Keyword(s):  
Water Supply ◽  
Urban Poor ◽  
Urban Water ◽  
Urban Water Supply ◽  
Water Sector ◽  
Colonial Era ◽  
The Public ◽  
Demographic Processes ◽  
Political Economic ◽  
Service Standards

ABSTRACTMajor institutional reforms are currently under way to improve the performance of the public water sector in Kenya. However, a historical perspective is needed in order to achieve sustainable improvements that will also benefit the urban poor. This article seeks to provide such a perspective, applying a cross-disciplinary and socio-technical approach to urban water supply over the last century, in which institutions, organisations and technology are seen to interact with political, economic and demographic processes. Despite a series of reforms over the years, the socio-technical structure of the urban water sector in Kenya has shown a remarkable stability since the 1920s, and into the 1980s. However, the sustainability of the public service systems has been eroded since independence, due to changes in the institutional framework surrounding the systems, while exclusive standards and technological choices have essentially been preserved from the colonial era. Current sector reform must create incentives for addressing technology choices and service standards in order to provide public water services also for the urban poor.

scholarly journals How do citizens feel about their water services in the water sector? Evidence from the UK

2021 ◽  
Vol 33 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Kang Tian ◽  
Zhuo Chen ◽  
Han Wang
Keyword(s):  
Water Supply ◽  
Survey Methods ◽  
Water Services ◽  
Water Sector ◽  
Social Survey ◽  
Technology Application ◽  
The Public ◽  
Water Supply Management ◽  
The Uk ◽  
Water Supply Services

AbstractAt present, many studies have used social survey methods to explore UK water citizens’ perceptions of the water sector’s water services, but there are few more targeted and systematic studies. This paper mainly displays the perceptions of UK water citizens on water services in the water sector in recent years and analyses the main reasons for different perceptions and possible strategies. We conduct extensive research from four aspects that are highly related to water services: water citizens’ perceptions of the water supply services and technology application (infrastructure construction) provided by the water sector; the state of communication between the water sector and water citizens and their perceptions of water supply management; water citizens’ perceptions of the comprehensive utilisation of water resources in the water sector; water citizens’ perceptions of the water prices set by the water sector. These discussions aim to discover citizens’ perceptions of the water sector and the effects on the public participation mechanism. These insights help attract the water sector’s attention so that the public’s opinions can genuinely support water policymakers and provide sure support for the water sector to formulate corresponding solutions.

scholarly journals Monitoring of fluoride in the public water supply using electrometric or colorimetric analyses

2020 ◽  
Vol 15 (6) ◽  
pp. 1
Author(s):  
Caio Luiz Lins-Candeiro ◽  
Karen Katlein Dolenkei ◽  
Luiz Renato Paranhos ◽  
Douglas Queiroz Santos ◽  
Jaime Aparecido Cury ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Water Supply ◽  
Dental Fluorosis ◽  
Fluoride Concentration ◽  
Public Water Supply ◽  
Water Fluoridation ◽  
The Public ◽  
Public Supply ◽  
Paired Samples ◽  
First Choice ◽  
Fluoride Ion Selective Electrode

The surveillance of the concentration of fluoride in the public water supply aims to ensure the balance between the benefits (carie prevention) and risk (dental fluorosis) of water fluoridation programs. The aim of this study was to check the accuracy of two analytical methods for monitoring the concentration of fluoride in the public water supply of a Brazilian city. The STROBE checklist was used to aid the conduction of this study and report the results. It was an analytical, observational, and prospective study using the water supply of Uberlândia, MG, Brazil. We collected 126 water samples at 21 sites for six consecutive months and analyzed them using the fluoride ion selective electrode (F-ISE) method and colorimetry with SPADNS. The statistical analysis was performed descriptively and then the ANOVA and Student t-test for paired samples were applied. The results showed that the F-ISE method had a lower coefficient of variation (12.3%) than the SPADNS method (57.4%). There was no significant variation of the fluoride concentration in the water through the supply network evaluated either by F-ISE as SPADNS. We concluded that the electrometric method should be the first choice for use by laboratories that monitor fluoride concentration in the public supply water.

Political ecologies of infrastructural and intestinal decay

2020 ◽  
pp. 251484862090238 ◽  
Author(s):  
Patrick Bresnihan ◽  
Arielle Hesse
Keyword(s):  
Water Supply ◽  
Technical Problem ◽  
Ecological Factors ◽  
Water Infrastructure ◽  
The Public ◽  
Rural And Urban ◽  
Group Water ◽  
Political Ecologies ◽  
Political Economic ◽  
Water Treatments

In March 2007, when Cryptosporidium contaminated water supplies in Galway City, Ireland, political authorities responded quickly to upgrade water treatments plants. This response framed the crisis as a solely technical problem of infrastructural decay, obscuring legacies of urban and agricultural (over)development. In this paper, we examine dominant responses to infrastructural contamination that depoliticize and re-inscribe divisions among bodies, nature, infrastructure, rural and urban. The temporality of the Galway outbreak and the speedy response by the state is not replicated throughout Ireland. In parts of rural Roscommon, the neighbouring county to Galway, microbiological risks to the drinking water supply have been left unattended for more than eight years. The interplay of social, political, economic, and ecological factors produces uneven exposures to health risks that are situated within and mediated through water infrastructure. Drawing on postcolonial insights, the unevenness of infrastructural provision across Ireland does not just tell a story of exclusion and othering, but also provides space for different infrastructural projects to unfold. While the response to contamination within the public water supply replayed well-known technical fixes, the work of the National Federation of Group Water Schemes, the representative body of community managed water systems in rural Ireland, illustrates a different form of infrastructural practice that negotiates legacies of institutional abandonment and acknowledges the wider hydro-social cycle as part of, rather than ancillary to, water infrastructure. By blending political ecologies of health and postcolonial approaches to infrastructure, we analyse the unevenness of responses to infrastructural contamination and trace its relationship to legacies of uneven development and imaginaries of urban and rural Ireland.

scholarly journals ISSUES OF EFFICIENCY FOR PUBLIC-PRIVATE PARTNERSHIPS IN THE WATER SECTOR

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Simona Frone ◽  
Dumitru Florin Frone
Keyword(s):  
Water Supply ◽  
Public Private Partnerships ◽  
Water Sector ◽  
Investment Projects ◽  
The Public ◽  
Specific Investment ◽  
Analysis And Synthesis ◽  
Recent Developments ◽  
Sanitation Infrastructure ◽  
Water Supply And Sanitation

The water resources are critical for the economic development in a country or region, since the pollution and depletion of the waters are raising concerns for the environmental and economic efficiency of their management. This outlook calls for analysis on economic and financial issues and risks associated with specific investment projects in water supply and sanitation infrastructure WSS. In previous research outcomes we have shown successful models of Public-Private Partnerships (PPP) used to manage and mitigate the risks and improve performance in providing the public services of Water Supply and Sanitation (WSS). The main objective of this paper is to reiterate the PPP as an efficient business model for the water sector, by employing several methodologies: literature review, case studies, performance indicators, analysis and synthesis. Some features and experiences of PPP in the water sector are resumed and analysed, considering recent developments and leading to conclusions and recommendations on their opportunity and efficiency in Romania.

Water supply and sanitation planning model: a management tool for large Brazilian cities

2003 ◽  
Vol 3 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 469-476
Author(s):  
S.R.A. Soares ◽  
R.S. Bernardes
Keyword(s):  
Water Supply ◽  
Low Income ◽  
Management Tool ◽  
Urban Water ◽  
Rapid Urbanization ◽  
Modeling Approach ◽  
Developing Cities ◽  
Starting Point ◽  
Water And Wastewater ◽  
Water Supply And Sanitation

The sanitary problems promoted by the rapid urbanization process in developing cities are usually resulted from the absence of planning, high population concentration and inadequate water and wastewater infrastructure for low income people. Because the provision and planning of water supply and is a complex task, a modeling approach was used to enhance the understanding of the process and the aspects involved. In the development of a model, not only the technical aspects were taken into account, but other aspects related to the provision of drinking water and the water resources protection were also analyzed, such as institutional, financial, socioeconomic, environmental and public health. In the modeling process two different methods of conceptualization were used to describe the urban water flow through the water and wastewater systems linked to various aspects related to their implementation in large developing cities. The urban water systems of five large metropolitan areas in Brazil were also evaluated for the complete model. It is expected that the modeling approach developed in this paper consists of a valuable methodology for water supply and sanitation planning in Brazilian cities, and other developing cities with the same characteristics. The suggested conceptual model could, at least, provide more than a starting point for a useful urban water management tool.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document