Wellington City Council signal water shortages coming

Forums › Off topic › Wellington City Council signal water shortages coming - time to reconsider dishwashers?

lchiu7

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#299052 6-Aug-2022 16:18

Wellington running out of water and facing outdoor bans and shorter showers

https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/129457633/wellington-running-out-of-water-and-facing-outdoor-bans-and-shorter-showers

This post is not an indictment of the appalling management of Wellington's water infrastructure over the years but just to bring to attention another way we can reduce water usage - use the dishwasher instead of washing dishes by hand.

A US view but I think relevant here on how diswashers can save so much water over hand washing

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2022-08-01/doing-dishes-in-the-dishwasher-saves-water-is-p-g-s-cascade-ad-campaign

We use the dishwasher all the time but sometimes in the mistaken belief we should stack it to the brim before starting it to save electricity. When this happens often the dishes don't come out so clean as the dishes are so crowded together that the water cannot properly whish around them to properly clean them.

I think we are going to change our behaviour and wash more often.

This local guy says a standard wash uses about 43c electricity which is hardly exccessive.

http://thatpowerguy.nz/dishwasher-energy-consumption/#:~:text=Dishwasher%20Energy%20Consumption%20Per%20Load&text=On%20the%20default%20option%2C%20the,43c%20per%20wash.

And according to Bosch, perhaps slightly biased a standard dishwasher uses about 7l of water whereas that same wash in the sink could use 40 litres.

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#2951338 6-Aug-2022 16:28

In the middle of a wet winter, water shortages already forecast. Well done Wellington City Council. That's about what I expected.

robjg63

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#2951346 6-Aug-2022 16:58

But the councils are doing a wonderful job of running water services!!!!

Can't let the government steal it.

Let's fight to keep councils managing these important services so well.

(I am being very sarcastic here - just for those who have trouble detecting it)

Nothing is impossible for the man who doesn't have to do it himself - A. H. Weiler

antoniosk

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#2951355 6-Aug-2022 17:25

This seems to a standard approach being used by many public service bodies in the country right now... go public with details on what is munted/not working/too big to manage, in the hopes of central government stepping in and bailing it out with taxpayer funds.

It particularly galls when the new rates have just been announced, and despite the messaging over the last few months of 'average rates increase of 8%', i know some people whose rates have gone up 50% (because their valuations were incorrect, but still.... 50%).

So what will happen?

My guess is something along the lines of a partial government intervention for more repairs, stronger messaging on water controls... and the continued softening up of the public for the inevitable introduction of retrofitting water metering for more user pays.

If it genuinely went into investment in repairs and maintenance, a little easier to stomach. But the recent revelations of fluoridation and leak repair failures combined with no accountability or sanctions and a culture of deny defer dismiss and diminish... well, I'm guess I'm more cynical....

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alasta

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#2951362 6-Aug-2022 17:47

timmmay:
In the middle of a wet winter, water shortages already forecast. Well done Wellington City Council. That's about what I expected.

Now, now. You should just be grateful that they have built a bunch of gold plated cycleways that noone uses!

Dingbatt

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#2951364 6-Aug-2022 17:55

To get back to the OP (rather than slagging local body incompetence), I was surprised at the figure of 40l for a hand wash (the equivalent of 25 1.5l bottles), but I guess by the time you take rinsing into account it would get up there.

New Zealanders are great at using high quality drinking water for everything from watering the garden and washing the car, to flushing the toilet. I have prepared a site for a tank to harvest water for outside use, however when I went to get one, they were out of stock for at least 3 months. Plumbing becomes a bit of a problem if you want to use it for non potable inside things (ie clothes washing, toilet flushing).

When Auckland last had restrictions we did our best (shorter showers, etc) but still used the dishwasher. But was dismayed when the neighbour across the road washed both his cars, without fail on a Sunday afternoon for months, with a running hose. Eventually an ACC car turned up so I was obviously not the only ‘annoyed’ neighbour (possibly the one who stood on the pavement and abused him).

In a previous water shortage the council suggested putting a brick in the toilet cistern to reduce the amount of water in it. But that, combined with half flush buttons, meant the “solids to liquids” ratio was too great and the sewers clogged up.

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lchiu7

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#2951366 6-Aug-2022 18:07

This thread went off track a bit so followingo on from that here is are the salaries of the employees at Wellington Water.

No guesses for how much the CEO receives:-(

But the salaries in the other bands are pretty high also.

They are overpaid IMHO.

lchiu7

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#2951367 6-Aug-2022 18:11

Dingbatt:

..

When Auckland last had restrictions we did our best (shorter showers, etc) but still used the dishwasher. But was dismayed when the neighbour across the road washed both his cars, without fail on a Sunday afternoon for months, with a running hose. Eventually an ACC car turned up so I was obviously not the only ‘annoyed’ neighbour (possibly the one who stood on the pavement and abused him)

...

Don't you folks in Auckland have water meters? In Welly we don't, yet...

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PolicyGuy

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#2951371 6-Aug-2022 19:31

lchiu7:

Don't you folks in Auckland have water meters? In Welly we don't, yet...

This is a view that will generate a lot of hate in some parts of society, but IMO water meters are a major part of the answer.

Water meters incentivise consumers to be find and fix leaks, and to be careful with their water use.
Metering also enables the supplier to more easily find leaks, if they install an hierarchy of meters - if a certain volume of water moves through a higher-level meter, but the sum of the lower level meters is lower than this, then there's a leak in that particular branch of the tree.

One of the objections to household water metering is that you can't cut off a family from the water supply because they can't afford to pay the water rates. An Australian water authority (maybe in Perth?) had a simple answer for this: don't cut off their water, just install a restriction washer that will allow through enough water to flush a toilet, get a drink or do basic cooking, but not enough to have a shower or run a bath in any time that wouldn't mean having a cold bath by the time it filled.

Another part of the answer is to radically change the pay structure of the top two or three layers of the supply authority, so that a large proportion of their pay depends on reducing losses (i.e. leaks) in the system. That way they are more likely to manage network maintenance effectively and - if consumers are really lucky - efficiently too.

These two measures would at least provide that the available water supply is actually used rather than just leaked away.
This is a necessary condition, but not the whole answer

wellygary

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#2951374 6-Aug-2022 19:57

lchiu7:

This thread went off track a bit so followingo on from that here is are the salaries of the employees at Wellington Water.

No guesses for how much the CEO receives:-(

But the salaries in the other bands are pretty high also.

They are overpaid IMHO.

Do you what engineers earn currently , I would guess pretty much all of the 100K -150k positions were water engineers, hydrologists or other technical staff... heck most plumbers would be earning over 100K a few years into the job these days

OldGeek

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#2951428 6-Aug-2022 20:25

The water supply in Wellington is hobbled by distribution (not supply) issues and by the fact that for residential properties there is no metering in place. Water supply is taken from an aquifer below the Hutt Valley and pumped to reservoirs around the region. Water levels in those reservoirs rise overnight and lower during the day. When demand exceeds supply over time there is a problem. The capacity to distribute is the issue.

Residential properties are not metered. There is no means of measuring per-household consumption. Water rates are a standard amount per household so those that use huge amounts of water pay the same as those who use very little, and therefore there are no funds to invest specifically in increased supply infrastructure.

Reducing domestic demand is a stop-gap measure that is bound to fail because Water rates do not reduce by doing so. In my 16 years living in Wellington there was never the political will to tackle the underlying causes of the problem - install meters and charge by usage for domestic consumers as for commercial users.

Lastly this is a Wellington issue that will not be fixed by 3-waters because the Water Entity C will face exactly the same issues and intractable opposition to change in Wellington.

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lchiu7

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#2951432 6-Aug-2022 20:36

PolicyGuy:

lchiu7:

Don't you folks in Auckland have water meters? In Welly we don't, yet...

This is a view that will generate a lot of hate in some parts of society, but IMO water meters are a major part of the answer.

Water meters incentivise consumers to be find and fix leaks, and to be careful with their water use.
Metering also enables the supplier to more easily find leaks, if they install an hierarchy of meters - if a certain volume of water moves through a higher-level meter, but the sum of the lower level meters is lower than this, then there's a leak in that particular branch of the tree.

From my reading of the report the main issue is not consumers using more water but leaks in the network.

"The report noted the Wellington region was already going through the volume of water usually used in the summer period – not because of high water usage, but because there were so many leaks in the system."

Hard for a consumer to address that.

wellygary

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#2951434 6-Aug-2022 21:04

lchiu7:

From my reading of the report the main issue is not consumers using more water but leaks in the network.

"The report noted the Wellington region was already going through the volume of water usually used in the summer period – not because of high water usage, but because there were so many leaks in the system."

Hard for a consumer to address that.

Yip, in 2020 it was estimated network losses from leakages were 19% (the range was 7-32%) of all water entering the network...

https://www.stuff.co.nz/dominion-post/wellington-top-stories/122269064/2-billion-litres-of-water-lost-in-widespread-wellington-drinking-water-leakage

robjg63

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#2951460 6-Aug-2022 21:53

Councils build sewers and water networks with (say) 50 year projected lifespans.
They regularly defer putting away capital each year for replacement (so the rates don't go up too much and in the hope they might get voted back in).

Finally when the 120 year old pipe network implodes 'everyone' is surprised and its crisis time.

The infrastructure in many centres is achingly old.

Plenty of other councils run things just the same....

Nothing is impossible for the man who doesn't have to do it himself - A. H. Weiler

Geektastic

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#2951461 6-Aug-2022 22:20

I just do not understand why they do not build proper reservoirs in NZ.

It rains all the time in winter in Wellington and the surrounds. They save absolutely none of that and then tell people that they have to go without all summer.

In 1976, Britain had a massive drought. The following year, Parliament passed the Rutland Water Act that created a reservoir with a 26 mile circumference (42km if you prefer) and required an entire village to be resettled because the existing one would be under water. The reservoir supplies water to several water companies. It is also a huge recreational facility with sailing clubs, water skiing, bird watching, a cycle path around it and it is stocked with trout for which many people pay to catch.

Yet here, we let thousands of cubic litres an hour wash into the sea every week of winter then claim we have no water in summer.

Frankly it is pathetic - there is no excuse.

MikeB4

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#2951463 6-Aug-2022 22:35

@Geektastic Te Whanganui a Tara has a few reservoirs both close to the city and further out eg Te Maria twin lakes. There is also a very large underground reservoir AKA the harbour Aquifer. The issue is not storage is the containment once the water leaves the storage.

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