Looking forward to Wessex Water's Open Data Day 2026
Wessex Water are hosting an Open Data Day¹ next week on 9th-10th March, with the "Stream Challenge Statement 2026" of:
How might we, using a variety of data sources, better understand and communicate national, regional and local water availability, so that everyone* can make better- informed water use decisions?
individuals, households, organisations, government and regulators
Data, understanding, communication, cooperation, better decision making. This is music to my ears!
Let's go Wessex Water!
Some more research around this.
What Units Could be Used to Communicate Water Use / Availability?
Whilst reading Environment Agency's Public water supply - drought risks, impacts and actions: Drought prospects for spring 2026 the thought occurred to me about communicating water availability. We need a relatable value.
As David MacKay says on page 24 of his book Sustainable Energy - Without the Hot Air
Most discussions of energy consumption and production are confusing because of the proliferation of units in which energy and power are mea- sured, from “tons of oil equivalent” to “terawatt-hours” (TWh) and “exa- joules” (EJ). Nobody but a specialist has a feeling for what “a barrel of oil” or “a million BTUs” means in human terms. In this book, we'll express everything in a single set of personal units that everyone can relate to.
The unit of energy I have chosen is the kilowatt-hour (kWh). This quantity is called “one unit” on electricity bills, and it costs a domestic user about 10p in the UK in 2008. As we'll see, most individual daily choices involve amounts of energy equal to small numbers of kilowatt-hours.
When we discuss powers (rates at which we use or produce energy), the main unit will be the kilowatt-hour per day (kWh/d). We'll also occasionally use the watt (40 W ≈ 1kWh/d) and the kilowatt (1 kW = 1000 W = 24 kWh/d), as I'll explain below. The kilowatt-hour per day is a nice human-sized unit: most personal energy-guzzling activities guzzle at a rate of a small number of kilowatt-hours per day. For example, one 40 W lightbulb, kept switched on all the time, uses one kilowatt-hour per day.
A quantity of energy here is being expressed as 1 kWh. And a flow rate like power is expressed as 1kWh/d. What is the relatable units for water consumption & availability?
Maps
Who doesn't like a good map?!
High level map of coverage area includes major settlements and the type of service provided (water, wastewater / sewerage, or both).
Map of reported leaks and maintenance works
Financial Data
2023-2024 Ofwat "Monitoring Financial Resilience Report" included this table of key financial metrics on page 13.
Leaks
Video explaining how leaks are reported, promises about timescales for investigation and repair, and about how the state will be left afterwards:
Notes
¹ Open Data Days is an initiative started by Open Knowledge Foundation