Catanzano, Bosetti, Walton, Serrao
The World # 2006 Washington DC
The development of gas, water and sewerage networks greatly enhanced city life in the late 19th and early 20th Century providing much needed street lighting and dramatically reducing water borne disease. Understandably in many European cities these underground piping systems are now showing serious signs of their age. In Italy as in other European countries the government has been reluctant to invest in these systems – at least until the situation becomes critical. This has resulted in high water leakage rates in some areas which are now compounded by water shortages due to the increasingly dry, hot summers. An attempt is being made to address this situation by representatives of the complete “Pipe Chain”, from raw material producer, pipe & fitting makers, utility companies through to consumer representatives. Conceived at the last Plastics Pipes Conference in Baveno this group have tried to understand the needs and started to formulate some proposals to improve the infrastructure that can be discussed with Government Departments and other organisations. This paper describes how this process has developed and describes some of the proposals initiated so far which may provide a useful model for other countries to follow.
