Joan Collins (Dublin South Central, People Before Profit Alliance)
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To ask the Minister for Environment, Community and Local Government the information he has regarding the unaccounted for water in private estates built during the period 1992 to 2012 receiving treated water from public water mains and the measures that have been taken to charge the developers of these estates for this wasted resource. [5563/13]

Phil Hogan (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fine Gael)
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The most recent published figures for unaccounted for water for each of the local authority administrative areas are set out in the report Service Indicators in Local Authorities 2010. The report was published by the Local Government Management Services Board and a copy is available in the Oireachtas Library. The information in respect of unaccounted for water does not differentiate between the types of properties supplied from public water mains.

My Department’s Water Services Investment Programme 2010 – 2013 places a high priority on water conservation. Funding is particularly targeted at areas where the level of unaccounted for water is unacceptably high.

Since the national water conservation programme was implemented in 2003, over €247 million has been specifically invested in water conservation measures by my Department. In addition, local authorities fund active leakage control, detection and repair from their own operational budgets. Most of the effort to date has been focused on putting in place the water management systems to allow for active leakage control and better planning of mains rehabilitation. Most local authorities have now prepared watermains rehabilitation strategies, which set out the priority mains for replacement and repair, and provide the platform for accelerated investment in this area over the coming years. The primary objective of this programme of work is to reduce water loss and leakage in the distribution networks to an economic level and to address high levels of unaccounted for water. Over time, this investment coupled with ongoing active leakage control should lead to marked reductions in unaccounted for water and improve service to customers.

The proposed water metering programme will complement the continuing programme of investment in water mains rehabilitation and replacement. The installation of water meters will encourage households to conserve water, reduce consumption and ensure that customer side leaks can be identified and fixed. Metering will, therefore, achieve significant reductions in the volumes of water that are required to be produced and treated and will lead to savings in the operational costs of delivering water services and in deferred capital expenditure.