Dry Pipes: Associations between Utility Performance and Intermittent Piped Water Supply in Low and Middle Income Countries

Abstract

Intermittent piped water supply impacts at least one billion people around the globe. Given the environmental and public health implications of poor water supply, there is a strong practical need to understand how and why intermittent supply occurs, and what strategies may be used to move utilities towards the provision of continuous water supply. Leveraging data from the International Benchmarking Network for Water and Sanitation Utilities, we discover 42 variables that have statistically significant associations with intermittent water supply at the utility scale across 2115 utilities. We categorized these under the following themes: Physical infrastructure system scale, coverage, consumer type, public water points, financial, and non-revenue water and metering. This research identifies globally relevant factors with high potential for cross-context, scaled impact. In addition, using insights from the analysis, we provide empirically grounded recommendations and data needs for improved global indicators of utility performance related to intermittent supply.