$5000-a-leak: Water repair costs more than triple

Monday, 11 March 2024

A water leak on Willis St on Sunday, part of Wellington’s so-called Golden Mile.

The cost to fix a leak has more than tripled as Wellington Water, sitting on an 800-leak backlog, tells the city council to hurry up on another $1 million.

Wellington Water, a water utility owned by councils in Wellington, Hutt Valley, Porirua and South Wairarapa, asked the Wellington City Council in December for an extra $2m to fix its leak backlog.

It was granted an additional $1m with an extra $1m if it met goals. Now a report to the council shows a backlog of 74 leaks had been fixed at a cost of $365,000. But the backlog has grown from 800 to 806 because more leaks have been added to the need-to-be fixed list.

At $4932-per-leak, that works out more than triple the 2021 average-per-leak of $1500, which was then raised to an estimated $3000 by October 2023, according to a recent report to council.

A dry summer mixed with decades of underinvestment in pipes means the areas covered by Wellington Water are currently under a sprinkler and irrigation ban with the chance of a ban on all outdoor use now at 43%.

In February it was estimated that 44% of the region’s drinking water was lost to leaks. Wellington Water first said that getting plumbers to fix leaks was not feasible but in February it did a U-turn saying it was open to the idea.

In January, Lambton Quay retailers started counting the days it took to get a leak fix on one of the capital’s busiest shopping streets.

But in an email to councillors, council waste, water, and resilience manager Chris Mathews said work to get Wellington Water to do this was “progressing at a glacial pace”.

Councillor Ben McNulty said the expectation of the $2m December funding boost was that 800 leaks would be fixed at an average cost of $2500 a leak.

Wellington Water was meeting with councillors on Tuesday and McNulty said, without some good answers about why the backlog wasn’t being properly addressed, he would call for the remaining $1m to go towards the council directly employing plumbers to clear the backlog.

Wellington Water acting chief executive Keith Locke said the water utility fixed 399 Wellington City leaks in February — but just 74 from the funding boost. The programme could not start until January 29 due to the Christmas break and time for planning and set-up.

It tried to use the money “as quickly as possible” but it needed to find available contractors.

“Unfortunately, we cannot simply turn on this type of work overnight,” he said.

The quick ramp-up also led to higher costs as “a result of the leaks being more complex and the fact that we’ve had to rely solely on external contractors”.

It was estimated the first $1m would be used by the end of April but Wellington Water needed to know by March 22 if the second $1m would come or “we will have to let our contractors go”, Locke said.

Councillor Tim Brown and Iona Pannett were the only two councillors to vote against the extra $2m.

“There is a fundamental issue with accountability, which has not in any way been addressed by the short report they have now provided,” Brown said on Sunday. “More money seems to have far more effect on the cost of each fix than on the number of fixes.”

Pannett said there needed to be more accountability and Wellington Water “needs to pick up the pace”.

Mayor Tory Whanau said the new Wellington Water figures were “disappointing” and showed the water utility needed “stronger reporting and accountability measures”. The council was working with other councils on a new model for council-controlled organisations, of which Wellington Water was one.