EUROPEAN EXPERIENCE 123 



There are a number of reasons for this. In some cases the 

 meters have been less efficient. Whether this has been generally 

 so, present evidence is not sufficient to determine. In Germany 

 particularly the number of services per thousand of population 

 is less, large blocks in which many families live all served by a 

 single service being common, and this, no doubt, tends to reduce 

 the loss by under-registration of meters. 



Water also has been more valuable relatively in Europe, and 

 through a long term of years means of detecting and stopping 

 waste have been persistently followed up. 



Statistics with remarkable completeness are available for 

 German water-works system before the war. The table on 

 p. 124 shows the largest water- works systems, with their outputs 

 of water and the proportion of the same recorded by meters.* 



Not all of these cities were completely metered, but data 

 are not at hand to show what percentages of the taps were 

 unmetered. Comparison with similar data for American cities 

 shows strikingly the greater percentage of water that is accounted 

 for. 



Washington, D. C., Experience. The Water Department of 

 the District of Columbia started a campaign against water waste 

 about 1906. The work was planned on a comprehensive scale 

 and has been followed up diligently, and is probably the most 

 thorough work that has been done in this line. A record has 

 been kept of the various leaks which have been found and 

 remedied and these have been classified in the table which 

 follows. 



This table is particularly interesting, as it shows the large 

 quantities of water that may escape from a system without 

 making themselves evident at the surface. It is clear from the 

 last column of the table, too, that larger leaks were found dur- 

 ing the early years of the work, and as these have been remedied 

 and as the efficiency of the force employed on waste investigations 

 has increased, smaller leaks have been found and remedied. 



Another point of importance that may be noted is that the 



* XXIII Statistical Compilation of Water Works Statistics for the 

 year 1912, R. Oldenbourg, Munich. 



