Guilty thirst, half of the water in the network ends up wasted due to leaks in the pipes

Istat:drinking water dispersed in 2022 would meet the water needs of 43.4 million people for an entire year

ROME – While we talk about alarm drought, there is another parallel and complementary one:I waste it.With a given calculated by Istat which sums up the environmental scandal perfectly: in 2022 the water dispersed in municipal drinking water distribution networks would satisfy the water needs of 43.4 million people for an entire year.

In 2022, the volume of total water losses in the water distribution phase is equal to 3.4 billion cubic meters, 42.4% of the water released into the network.The indicator has risen very slightly compared to 2020 (when it was at 42.2%), confirming the persistent state of inefficiency of many distribution networks.
Although in recent years many water service managers have launched initiatives to ensure greater capacity for measuring consumption and the containment of network losses, the quantity of water dispersed in distribution continues to represent a considerable volume, quantifiable as 157 liters per day for inhabitant.Estimating per capita consumption equal to the national average, the volume of water dispersed in 2022 would satisfy the water needs of 43.4 million people for an entire year (which corresponds to approximately 75% of the Italian population).

Total network losses are attributable to:physiological factors, present in all water infrastructures as there is no zero loss system;breakages in the pipelines and age of the systems, especially prevalent in some areas of the territory;administrative factors, due to meter measurement errors and unauthorized uses (illegal connections).

Although the losses have a highly variable trend, the territorial and infrastructural differences reproduce the consolidated North-South gradient, with the most critical situations in the areas of the Center and South, falling within the hydrographic districts of the Apennine and insular belt.

In 2022, the river basin districts with the largest total losses in distribution are Sardinia (52.8%), Sicily (51.6%) and the southern Apennines (50.4%), followed by the central Apennines (45.5%).The indicator, however, reaches its minimum value in the Po River district (32.5%) and is slightly lower than the national figure in the districts of the Eastern Alps (40.9%) and Northern Apennines (40.6%).