Water meters at the house won't show you where the leaks are - unless the contention is that a vast majority of leaks is happening behind the toby on people's property
Replies
That's what Wellington Water reckon is happening. Up to 40% of network loss. That's not particularly strongly evidenced however.
aug 20, 2025, 6:32 am β’ 2 0 β’ view
Surely the money spent on installing, maintaining, and charging based on water metres would be better spent fixing the pipes where 60% of water loss is happening....
aug 20, 2025, 7:12 am β’ 1 0 β’ view
And this is before we get on to issues to do with Labour values and charging based on use rather than property value/income.
aug 20, 2025, 7:24 am β’ 1 0 β’ view
Water metering on the KΔpiti Coast has been a huge success and a whole bunch of people who were against it when it happened have since admitted they were wrong. It's an absolute no brainer, along with continuing to upgrade water infrastructure.
aug 20, 2025, 7:30 am β’ 1 0 β’ view
Thatβs interesting and Iβm aware of arguments in favour of it. What Iβm less aware of is research on the outcomes for economically disadvantaged people. Do you have anything that you can share about this?
aug 20, 2025, 7:35 am β’ 1 0 β’ view
I don't know if you pay by usage, we only get charged for excessive use and it's helped to encourage us to be careful. Our household of three always seems to be 'low' usage.
aug 20, 2025, 7:34 am β’ 1 0 β’ view
We pay $80-120 per quarter. Depends if my boys have left the hose running or not.
aug 20, 2025, 7:40 am β’ 1 0 β’ view
I'm sure we are "paying" via our rates. But psychologically it's nice to have a way to avoid any charge.
aug 20, 2025, 7:44 am β’ 1 0 β’ view
Yeah I'm not keen on RUC for that reason. Bloody admin.
aug 20, 2025, 7:46 am β’ 0 0 β’ view
What does a huge success mean? Are people paying less rates+water now than before when it was combined, with better maintained infrastructure?
aug 20, 2025, 7:33 am β’ 0 0 β’ view
We have never had a water shortage since water meters went in. When other parts of Wellington Region are on water restrictions we haven't had to worry. Most water infrastructure went in here post 1950 so we aren't dealing with same issues as CBD Wellington in that respect.
aug 20, 2025, 7:39 am β’ 0 0 β’ view
By what mechanism did the presence of water meters prevent water shortages?
aug 20, 2025, 7:47 am β’ 0 0 β’ view
So as far as I can tell, most of the benefits of water metres are not due to the fact that water metres mean people are charged for water usage. We could install water metres as a management system, keep the much simpler system of paying for water in rates, and reduce water waste
aug 20, 2025, 7:54 am β’ 0 0 β’ view
Water use reducing by a quarter because people actually think about what they are using is a pretty massive benefit.
aug 20, 2025, 7:56 am β’ 1 0 β’ view
The mechanism by which water metres reduces water waste the risk of water shortages seems to mainly be by identifying leaks.
aug 20, 2025, 7:55 am β’ 0 0 β’ view