Non-revenue water loss in Iran is at least 10% higher than in neighboring states because close to 90,000 kilometers of pipelines in the national water network are corroded and must be replaced, director of the Consumption Management Office at the National Water and Wastewater Engineering Company of Iran (Abfa) said.
“Abfa’s non-revenue water loss stands at 30% and the company needs $500 million to reduce it by 1%,” Ali Akbar Ghazali was also quoted as saying by IRNA.
As per last year’s budget bill, an estimated $2 million were supposed to be allocated to fund projects aimed at reducing water loss, which is yet to be received by the state-run firm, he added.
Ghazali warned that although Abfa has devised comprehensive plans to reduce water loss, as long as it is grappling with financial constraints, those plans cannot be carried out.
Drawing a parallel between Iran and other neighbors, he noted that non-revenue water loss amounts to 11%, 15%, 20%, 25% and 29% in Qatar, the UAE, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and Egypt respectively.
“Of the total annual waste, 15% are real losses [through leaks, also referred to as physical losses] and 15% are apparent losses [through theft or metering inaccuracies]," he said.
Real losses were around 30% in 2014, which Abfa has reduced by 17% in the last decade. Non-revenue water refers to water that has been produced and lost in different ways before it reaches consumers.
“Abfa supplies close to 7 billion cubic meters of water to the national distribution network each year, of which massive 30% are wasted,” he said.
"The wastage rate in developed countries is 15%. There is no such thing as ‘zero wastage’ even in the most developed grids in the world."
As per the Sixth Five-Year Economic Development Plan (2017-22), non-revenue water loss should annually decrease by 0.5%.
According to Ghazali, the goal of reducing water wastage cannot be accomplished unless 10,000 kilometers of the water network are rehabilitated per annum.
Drainage Networks
According to Mohammad Ebrahim Raisi, a water resource management expert, the biggest water loss occurs in the field of agriculture, which is due to the lack of irrigation and drainage networks.
This causes water to be wasted in various ways and instead of feeding farmlands, it either leaks into the ground or evaporates.
Giving an example, he said, “If water is supplied to farmlands through the pipeline, 110 cubic meters of water will be sent to supply 100 cubic meters, but if we transfer water from a concrete canal to supply the same amount of water, 130 cubic meters must be sent because a part of the water evaporates on the way. If it is an earthen canal, 150 cubic meters of water should enter the canal because in addition to evaporation, a part of water seeps into the ground.”
The expert noted that the establishment of modern irrigation and drainage networks can help prevent part of the water loss in farming and increase irrigation efficiency from 30% to 60%.
Speaking about the industrial sector, the official said this sector has prevented water loss to some extent by implementing recycling projects.
“Water loss in the urban sector is high. Money is spent on treating the water that is collected behind dams and transferring it to the cities. But according to statistics, between 15% and 20% of the water are lost on the way,” he added.
This was called unaccounted-for water in the past, which is the difference between the quantity of water supplied to a city's network and the metered quantity of water used by customers.
“The name was later changed to non-revenue water. For example, of the total 125 cubic meters of water transferred to a subscriber, about 100 cubic meters reach the destination. This happens while the utility spent money on transferring the whole 125 cubic meters, but the subscriber only pays for 100 cubic meters,” Raisi said.
“The most important reason for this loss is that we did not invest adequately in the pipelines. Instead of defining new water resources, the authorities should replace worn-out pipes and save water by preventing wastage.”
