The ghost of water rationing hovers over the capital these days. In fact, the hypothesis (or perhaps the threat) launched by Acea of leaving a million and a half Romans without water for 8 hours a day starting from 28 July is realistic.
D-day, scheduled for next Friday, is approaching, and we are still a long way from an agreement that would allow us to avoid rationing. Even the Vatican has decided to close all the fountains located in the Vatican Gardens and in the territory of the State. A meeting between Mayor Virginia is scheduled for Tuesday afternoon Rays and Governor Nicholas Zingaretti to avoid the stoppage.
This is most likely the straw that broke the camel's back. It's true, the drought emergency that is hitting the boot is an extraordinary fact. Almost two thirds of the peninsula is dry, fields and farms already have millions and millions of damages. It may well be one of the hottest years of the last century, but the general situation and the state of health of water services in Italy is not good at all, and not starting only this year.
Attention seems to be directed more to the weather forecast, with the hope of some timid rain bringing fresh air, than to the heavy and long-lasting difficulties and problems that have been affecting the Italian water service.
The 2016 annual report of theAeegsi – the competent authority for all network services (electricity, gas, and water) – photographed the state of “age” of the water networks, providing little reassuring data. Suffice it to say that 24% of aqueduct pipes and 27% of sewage networks are used for 50 years, exceeding their normal and physiological useful life by a good 10 years, which is equal to 40 years. Overuse causes losses in efficiency.
To make the situation worse is another fact: even the 92% of interventions on aqueducts are of an "unplanned" nature. It is therefore a question of a management - underlines the Authority - "emergency in which planning is lacking".
The big problem is represented by the fact that the water sector enjoys insufficient investments, unsuitable for making improvements to a network that is now largely obsolete and overused for too many years. According to the Authority, the investment needs reported by operators for aqueducts, sewers and purification in the period 2016-2019 correspond to approximately 3,2 billion euros annually. To create liquidity and increase the assets destined for new investments, in 2016 there was an average variation in tariffs, compared to the previous year, of 4,57%. An increase that has not been uniform throughout Italy; in the South they grew by 6,09%, in the Center by only 2,38%. The sample consulted by the Authority involved 130 operators; projecting these values onto the national population, the required expenditure rises to 12,7 billion of requirements by 2019.
But are the announced investments really made? The checks carried out by the Authority have highlighted one gap between actual investment expenditure and planned needs, with a decreasing implementation rate of planned interventions (81,5% in 2014, 78,2% in 2015). In particular, the large operators of the Central Italy that incurred an expense in line with the forecasts elaborated, while other managements (in Piedmont, Lombardy, Puglia), they recorded a large deviation from the programming carried out, mainly due to delays in obtaining the authorizations from the competent administrations.
Image: Total investments planned for the four-year period 2016-2019 - Planned investment needs in billions of euros
The Authority was then able to evaluate the growth trend in the value of water structures in the period 2016-2019. Between the first and last year of the four-year period there is a 17% increase at national level.
Image: Dynamics of the RAB in the four-year period 2016-2019 - Billions of €
We advance, therefore, but slowly, with one average expenditure for the integrated water service of 291 €/year, VAT included. The value is lower in the South and in the Islands (€284/year) and higher in the Center (€344/year).
The per capita figure is higher in the area of the country where the competent entities have planned, for the four-year period 2016-2019, a higher investment spending to be financed through tariff. This is not accidental. Rates go up where there are operators ready to invest what they get to improve the health of their networks.
The size of those who manage them aggravates the situation of water networks in Italy. The municipalised in fact they are often small, unable to positively affect the efficiency of the water sector.
On the basis of the interventions envisaged in the four-year period 2016-2019, the critical areas that require more investments are mainly concentrated in the services of sewage and sewage – the subject of three infringements of European legislation – followed by the service of water distribution.
Image: Distribution of planned investments – period 2016-2019
The most frequently represented critical issues relating to the purification activity are attributable to the absence of the service in some areas of the territory managed and to the total inadequacy in terms of plant obsolescence and incompleteness of treatments. On the other hand however, the sewage service, physically inadequate, is unable to achieve total coverage of the population. All this, as we can see, has nothing to do with drought but with the ability of administrators to run companies efficiently. And water, as we have seen several times over the years, has turned into an "electoral weapon", low tariffs to gain consensus at the expense of investments.
But where does the water we use every day come from? There are three possible types of supply: 34% from sources, 49% from underground sources and 17% from surface water bodies. There are three fundamental elements for an efficient management of the infrastructures and for an effective control of water leaks: districtisation, monitoring of the networks and programmed search for hidden leaks.
However, continuing to hope for some summer storms, everyone's hope is that there will be a real and real change, made up of huge investments, aimed at making such an important service more efficient and renewed.
