Water loss indicators used in public water supply services in Brazil: Literature research and review

Edumar Ramos Cabral Coelho

Saulo Biasutti

ABSTRACT: The amount of water loss, expressed through indicators is an important element in assessing the efficiency of water supply services. The International Water Association (IWA), in the late 90’s, laid the normative basis of the performance indicators for water supply services. The standard of IWA indicators was successful, being adopted by many countries. In Brazil there is still no consolidated national standard of loss indicators and therefore a lot of indicators are used by managers of the water supply sector. Through systematic review of the technical and scientific literature, this project aims to investigate the various types of loss indicators adopted in Brazil, highlighting the variations in terminology, units and formulas. In the literature 164 case studies of various regions of the country were evaluated. The results show that there is not a standard for loss indicators in Brazil, since different nomenclatures and formulas are used to express the same display in different documents. Finally, it emphasizes the need for national standardization of language and concepts for a clearer definition of loss indicators, in order to allow a coherent assessment of the effectiveness of the managing bodies of water supply systems as to combat losses.

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