![\"Napier](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/napier-city-council-executive-director-of-water-services-rus-R5MIRWEL4FD6RB7Q2O35H5FV6A.jpg\")
<\/p>\nLeaky pipes in Napier and Hastings waste more than 15 million litres of water every day, a new report has found.<\/p>\n
By Linda Hall of Local Democracy Reporting<\/p>\n
The Network Environmental Performance Report for the 2024\/25 financial year, produced by the Water Services Authority, Taumata Arowai, includes data from councils across the country, including Wairoa District, Central Hawke’s Bay District, Hastings District and Napier City.<\/p>\n
The report shows Hastings District loses 436 litres per connection every day, the sixth-highest loss rate among the country\u2019s 62 councils, while Napier City loses 197 litres per connection daily.<\/p>\n
Hastings District Council\u2019s network has around 23,000 connections, and it wastes 10,028,000 litres of water daily.<\/p>\n
Napier City Council\u2019s 28,000 drinking water connections are losing 197 litres per connection per day, a total of 5,516,000 litres per day wasted.<\/p>\n
No data was provided in the report regarding leaks in Wairoa and CHB.<\/p>\n
Hawke’s Bay regional councillor Neil Kirton said he was concerned by both the data in the report, and what it lacked.<\/p>\n
“It is likely that all the region’s water infrastructure has either poor leakage management … or very inefficient use of its water resources,” Kirton said.<\/p>\n
“No matter the shape of local government to come, as our councils work through amalgamation, the biggest problem to be faced is the state of all our water woes.”<\/p>\n
More than 100 leaks in 114km of pipes<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Napier City Council executive director of water services Russell Bond said between June 2025 and March 2026 the council had found 107 leaks in 25% of its network. (Source: Supplied)<\/p>\n
A spokesperson for Hastings council said water leakage was complex and the findings in the latest report reinforced information previously reported by the council.<\/p>\n
In 2022\/23, smart water meters were installed in 2000 properties to trial the technology.<\/p>\n
An analysis of the meters in October 2024 showed a small number of homes were using much more water than others.<\/p>\n
The council contacted the owners of the seven highest-using properties, recommending they check for leaks or other issues.<\/p>\n
By 2025, their combined daily water use had dropped by 101 cubic metres.<\/p>\n
The spokesperson said the council continued working to increase its understanding of water loss.<\/p>\n
Napier City Council executive director of water services Russell Bond said between June 2025 and March 2026, the council inspected 114km of pipes, about 25% of its network, and found 107 leaks.<\/p>\n
He said leaks on private property were harder to address directly.<\/p>\n
But he said the council\u2019s Water Demand Management Strategy, adopted earlier this year, was a practical roadmap for changing how water was used.<\/p>\n
Bond said the roadmap also targeted the city\u2019s 100 largest non-residential water users, who account for 62% of metered non-residential demand, as well as schools, which make up a further 7.5%.<\/p>\n
Central Hawke’s Bay boasts highest residential water use<\/p>\n
The report also compared daily residential water use across the region, showing Central Hawke’s Bay had the highest consumption at 2270 litres per connection per day.<\/p>\n
Wairoa followed with 1684 litres, while Hastings recorded 1224 litres per connection each day.<\/p>\n
Napier was in the mid-range of councils for residential water use at 628 litres per connection per day.<\/p>\n
However, CHB infrastructure and asset management group manager Mark Kinvig said the water calculation in the report assumed the total volume of treated water produced went to residential connections only.<\/p>\n
“It did not take into account the volume of water our non-residential users use. Non-residential users include our commercial operators, which use the majority of our treated water,” Kinvig said.<\/p>\n
“We meter and charge our commercial users for water. Nor did it account for any water losses, as we have no water loss data.”<\/p>\n
The Hastings council spokesperson also said the accuracy of water use figures wasn\u2019t certain.<\/p>\n
“As noted by Taumata Arowai, these estimates should be interpreted with some caution.<\/p>\n
“They reflect mixed urban-rural usage, local network characteristics or data limitations, rather than actual household consumption alone,” the spokesperson said.<\/p>\n
The report also included wastewater information for 2024\/25, showing Napier City and Hastings District councils had 10 overflow events across the year, Central Hawke\u2019s Bay reported four, while no information was supplied for Wairoa.<\/p>\n
Central Hawke\u2019s Bay was near the top of the capital and operational spending table for drinking water nationally, spending $818 per person on capital and $969 on operational expenditure per person in the region in the 2024\/25 financial year.<\/p>\n
Napier was second to bottom for drinking water spending, $83 of capital and $87 of operational expenditure over the same period. Hastings District Council spent $183 per person on capital works and $162 on operational expenditure.<\/p>\n
\u2013 LDR is local body journalism co-funded by RNZ and NZ On Air.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Leaky pipes in Napier and Hastings waste more than 15 million litres of water every day, a new…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":558872,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[20277,111,43,139,69],"class_list":["post-558871","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-hawke-s-bay","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nz"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/558871","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=558871"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/558871\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/558872"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=558871"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=558871"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=558871"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}