THE RESULTS
7 millionDigital samples collected and analysed
25,000Points of interest generated
15,000Leaks confirmed
THE CONTEXT
A national target and a national skills shortage
Nineteen per cent of the water put into the UK network is lost before it reaches a customer. PR24 has put £104bn behind fixing that and the rest of the sector’s resilience problems, and leakage reduction is a regulatory commitment rather than an aspiration. The investment is there. What is not there is enough experienced leakage technicians to spend it, and the pool is ageing and shrinking while every water company bids for the same people.
THE CHALLENGE
A survey that leaves no evidence
Traditional leak detection is a craft skill, and it depends entirely on the individual holding the stick. Outcomes vary with the technician, the conditions and the day. That makes performance hard to assure, hard to compare and hard to scale at the pace the sector now needs.
It also loses almost everything the technician sees. On a street of a hundred properties, a handful will be leaking. The rest get listened to and forgotten. The stop tap types, the buried chambers, the assets that could not be accessed: none of it is captured. The data goes into someone’s ear and stops there.
our approach
Sample everything, record everything
We use iQuarius acoustic survey technology. A sensor is placed on a fitting, whether that is a valve, a hydrant or a customer’s stop tap, and a digital sample is taken. The sample shows whether there is a noise consistent with a leak. That much is standard. What matters is what happens around it.
Every sample is recorded and analysed, so the survey is evidenced rather than asserted. Because the method is standardised, a technician can deliver a reliable survey early in their time with us, which removes the recruitment bottleneck rather than competing in it. And because the operative is already at the fitting, we capture asset condition and network data at the same time, with no extra visit and no extra cost.
The result is a proactive survey of the client’s network, not a reactive hunt for leaks.
PROGRAMME AT A GLANCE
How it works in the field
Our approach with iQ transforms leakage management from a skills-dependent, variable process into a standardised, data-led and scalable solution.
Scope
Technology
Survey points
Coverage
Service area
Status
what this proves
A leakage survey that returns a network
The leaks get found. That happens anyway. What changes is everything else. Seven million samples is seven million pieces of evidence about a client’s network that would otherwise never have existed, covering asset records, network understanding and customer connections alongside the leakage itself. One visit does the work of several. That is what integrated delivery means in practice.
