Transit losses to the order of 35 m litres per day; theft adds to woes
Despite Mira Bhayandar Municipal Corporation’s (MBMC) multi-crore water augmentation projects in the pipeline, the twin-city is still losing a huge quantum of potable water in transit on a daily basis owing to leakages, unaccounted supply and theft.
As per information sourced out from the water supply department, the in-transit losses are to the order of 20 per cent which works out to a whopping 35 MLD from the total supply of 186 million liters each day (MLD) throughout the year.
As against the requirement of over 200 MLD, the twin-city, having a populace of more than 14 lakh, has a total supply of 186 MLD out of which 86 MLD comes from STEM water supply authority and the remaining 100 MLD from the Maharashtra Industrial Development Corporation (MIDC).
However, officials say that the actual supply hovers at an average of 170 MLD. After nearly a decade-long gap, the civic administration has finally appointed a private agency to carry out a detailed audit of its water supply and distribution network.
The scope of the project is to identify leakages, thefts and weeding out other shortcomings in the system. “ The audit report is nearly complete. After getting the reports, needed steps will be taken to reduce loses and map out the maximum utilisation of the water supply,” said City Engineer-Shivaji Barkund.
However the MBMC is clueless about the findings and the end results of the previous audit report, exposing their half-hearted efforts to plug loopholes in the water supply system.
Presently, there are more than 34,500 residential and 3,200 commercial water lines in the twin-city. While the exact amount of water lost cannot be ascertained unless the water audit is complete, the losses can be pegged at nothing less than 23 per cent, if the pilferage factor is also taken into account, sources revealed.