Wellington Water Limited is an infrastructure asset management company that manages the drinking water, wastewater and stormwater services of the councils in the Wellington Region of New Zealand.
Asset management scope
The three waters assets managed by Wellington Water are owned by councils including Hutt, Porirua, Upper Hutt and Wellington City councils, South Wairarapa District Council and Greater Wellington Regional Council. Wellington Water is jointly owned by all six councils. The South Wairarapa District Council transferred the management of their water infrastructure to Wellington Water, as from 1 October 2019. Wellington Water manages the water assets on behalf of the six councils, but the individual councils retain ownership of their assets, and set their own rates and user charges. Each council is represented on a regional Wellington Water Committee that provides overall leadership and direction for the company. Governance is provided by a board of independent directors.
Asset condition and service performance
The challenges for Wellington Water in managing the three waters include the deteriorated condition of pipelines in the Wellington metropolitan area. The pipelines are in significantly worse condition than those in other large networks nationwide, and there has been a recent history of serious failures. The water supply to the region is also at significant risk during a severe earthquake, although some projects are underway to improve resilience. Water supplies to the Wellington metropolitan area meet the requirements of the Health Act and conform with drinking water standards. However, for some of the towns in the Kapiti Coast and Wairarapa regions, there have been occasional non-conformances with the required standards for drinking water quality and safety.
Failure to meet performance targets
In December 2019, a report to the Wellington City Council revealed that Wellington Water was failing to meet performance targets for response times to urgent callouts, and that it required $600,000 of additional operating funding to clear a backlog of leak repairs. In February 2020, Wellington Water reported to Wellington City Council that it was not meeting its annual performance targets. It had already failed to meet targets for sewage overflows into the harbour, E coli contamination and callout response times. As one example, the average response time to urgent call outs was eight hours – twice the target of four hours. Wellington Water called for a 30 year programme of investment, and suggested that performance targets be relaxed. The MayorAndy Foster, said any suggestion to lower targets was rejected.
Management of large projects
A $10million increase in the forecast cost of the Omāroro reservoir was reported in June 2020, bringing the new total to almost $70million. Wellington City Councillors expressed concern about the ability of Wellington Water to manage a project of such a large scale. The council required an independent engineer to sit on Wellington Waters' Major Projects board, and report back to the council.
Industry reform
On 28 January 2020, the Minister of Local Government, Hon Nanaia Mahuta, released Cabinet papers and minutes setting out intentions for reform of service delivery and funding arrangements for the three waters services nationwide. The Cabinet paper referred to two key challenges of affordability and capability that are facing New Zealand's three waters service delivery. There was specific reference to Wellington Water as an example of one approach to service delivery that had successfully built capability through the scale of operations. However, the paper also noted that Wellington Water has no ability to make trade-offs between operating and capital expenditure, nor can it cross-subsidise between owners or ratepayers in different districts.
Public relations
In March 2020, following an period of multiple issues with failures leading to sewage contamination of Wellington harbour, beaches and waterways, Wellington Water engaged an international public relations company SweenyVesty to help improve its community engagement and consultation. In June 2020, there was criticism from a city councillor that Wellington Water had engaged a market research companyColmar Brunton to gather feedback from stakeholders. However, the Chair of the committee overseeing Wellington Water defended the expenditure on the grounds that the annual survey provides quantitative data for performance measures for the company and provides feedback to help the company improve.
