The Blue gold and its management of losses in Colombia

Abstract

Water is known as “blue gold”, and it’s also one of the natural resources that has the most importance in the world, since only 3% of the water is freshwater and only 1% is suitable for human consumption. For this reason, many countries have established public policies and control mechanisms to raise awareness and to ensure that more people contribute to save water and to make an efficient use of this resource, also reducing what is known as “water stress”. Despite Colombia being a country without “water stress”, the Government promotes and establishes policies of control and efficiency in the management and use of water. Therefore, in 2014 the Resolution CRA 688 was issued as a guideline for a new tariff scheme, where a standard for efficiency in the loss of water -for both technical and commercial losses, is established. As of 2017, Colombia loses 43.6% of the water produced; with the new tariff scheme the loss recovery programs implemented by the Public Utilities Companies are described, and concludes with the steps to be followed by a country that wishes to manage savings and an efficient use of the resource.