Global Water Market 2016 - GWI
Global Water Market 2016 - GWI
Global Water Market 2016 - GWI
Source: GWI
Figure 1.2 The global water market: opex and capex, 2016
Industrial capex 2.8%
Industrial opex 15.9%
Global water
capex and opex
Utility opex 48.3%
$714bn
(2016)
Source: GWI
Water stress
Low
High
• Urban water scarcity: The growth of cities creates a water resourcing challenge even in regions where in theory there
should be plenty of water. For example Singapore enjoys 2,497 mm of annual rainfall against the global average of
715 mm, yet the population density is such that the natural renewable water resources per capita are just 111 m³/per
capita/year. The city state has two large desalination plants and is planning two more.
• Seasonal water scarcity: Many parts of the world receive all their rainfall within a few months of the year (e.g. India,
the savannah regions of Sub-Saharan Africa, the Caribbean). This need not be a problem if there is sufficient scope
for water storage (in aquifers, lakes and reservoirs for example), but often there are physical limits to the amount of
water that can be held over during the dry season and additional infrastructure is required.
Seasonal variability
Low
High
• Drought-related scarcity: A region may generally have sufficient water resources, but be unable to meet its need in
the event of a drought. The propensity for severe droughts has increased with the on-set of global warming. Both
Australia and California have suffered millennial droughts in the past decade, while the Eastern Mediterranean
has suffered the worst drought in 900 years. The following map illustrates where severe droughts have been most
prevalent since 1900:
Drought severity
Low
High
There are two ways in which a community might respond to scarcity: either to manage demand or to increase supply.
2,500
Water withdrawal (km³/yr)
2,000
1,500
1,000
500
0
1900 1925 1950 1975 2000 2025
Source: Unesco
Demand management in agriculture is difficult because in many countries farmers do not expect to pay for water or to have
their right to use it limited in any way. Creating a water rights market is an effective means of addressing this problem, but such
markets only exist in the western United States, the Murray Darling Basin in Australia and in Israel. Most countries which suffer
from absolute water scarcity find it difficult to restrict agricultural water usage because of the fragility of their rural economies.
Demand management in industry tends to be driven primarily by pricing (i.e. water agencies charge significantly more for
water when they are selling to businesses than they do when they are selling to households), although this is often ineffective
because industrial water demand is relatively inelastic. In some countries (such as India) there is a move towards mandatory
water reuse targets as a means of improving water efficiency. Otherwise the main driver for water efficiency within companies is
environmental and social responsibility concerns; many businesses now set internal targets for water usage per unit of product.
Demand management in the domestic sector may involve rationing, restrictions on certain usages or pricing. Rationing and
restrictions are most effective during droughts, but politically difficult to sustain in the long term. Pricing is effective, but
politically unpopular.
On the wastewater side there are two separate issues: access to toilets, and the management of wastewater. Most of the available
data on access to sanitation relates to the MDG for sanitation which conflates the two issues. It defines improved sanitation
variously as a flush toilet, a piped sewer system, a septic tank, an improved pit latrine, or a composting toilet. The Joint
Monitoring Programme reported that by 2015, 13% of the world’s population practised open defecation, 10% had unimproved
sanitation, 9% shared sanitation and 68% improved sanitation. GWI has conflated this data with data on sewer connections and
secondary wastewater treatment to estimate the current status of wastewater treatment as follows:
Although the MDG period to 2015 saw improved sanitation rise from 54% of the world’s population to 68%, the reality is that
much of this progress was through improving access to septic tanks and pit latrines rather than an acceleration in the growth
rate of sewer networks.
The biggest obstacle to expanding access to water and sanitation is finance, both at the household level and at the utility level.
Low income households struggle to raise the money required to pay for connection charges, while utilities struggle to raise the
money to invest in new infrastructure, largely because they feel that it is incumbent on them not to charge cost recovery tariffs
for their services.
1.2.3 Regulation
Water is a highly regulated industry, both on the drinking water side, where public health is the main driver, and on the
wastewater treatment side where environmental protection is the main driver. New regulations drive markets. For example,
after the Milwaukee cryptosporidium outbreak of 1993 which killed more than 100 people, the US Environmental Protection
Agency introduced the Long Term 2 Enhanced Surface Water Treatment Rule. This entailed a broad overhaul of drinking water
treatment systems across the country, creating opportunities for ultrafiltration (UF) membranes and ultraviolet (UV) disinfection
which had not previously existed.
Regulation on its own rarely drives markets, however. Many countries have extremely stringent drinking water and wastewater
treatment regulations on paper, but in practice there is no enforcement. In China, for example, before 2015 wastewater
regulations were widely ignored by industrial water users, not least because the level of the threatened fines was lower than the
cost of compliance. At the end of 2014 the country introduced a new Environmental Protection Law, and in March and April 2015
the government began to arrest and imprison offenders for the first time. It has sent a strong signal to industrial water users that
this time they need to take the regulations seriously.
Besides public health and environmental regulation, there are two other areas of regulation which create market opportunities.
The first is structural regulations that define the roles and responsibilities of different actors within the water sector. This can be
a market driver because the new structures open the way for additional investment or because they create new opportunities for
private sector participation. The second is economic regulation which determines the financial basis for investment in water and
wastewater infrastructure. This reflects the fact that water is a natural monopoly and, particularly where utilities are owned by
the private sector, there is a need to regulate pricing to balance investment needs and consumer interests. Economic regulation
exists for privately owned utilities in the UK, the US, and Chile. It exists for publicly owned utilities in Australia, Portugal and to
a lesser extent in Germany.
The two most significant directives from the point of view of driving current markets are the Urban Wastewater Directive
(UWWD) and the Water Framework Directive (WFD). The UWWD is aimed at ensuring that all communities in the EU have
adequate arrangements for wastewater collection, treatment and disposal. It was supposed to have been introduced in two
stages, the first in 2000 for communities with populations in excess of 15,000 and the second in 2005 for smaller communities,
although the EU-12 group of recent EU entrants were given extended deadlines for compliance. All these deadlines, with
the exception of the end of 2018 date set for Romania, have now passed, and legal action is likely to follow. Four Southern
European countries – Spain, Italy, Portugal and Greece – which missed the original 2005 deadlines have been taken to court
by the European Commission, although the Euro crisis has meant that court action has not led to rapid compliance with the
regulations.
The WFD provides a legislative umbrella for all water-related directives, including the UWWD. The WFD introduces novel tools
and instruments into EU water law: an ecological, holistic approach to water status assessment; river basin planning; a strategy
for elimination of pollution; a greatly increased provision for informing and consulting the public; and economic instruments to
help meet environmental objectives. The WFD requires the establishment of programmes of measures to improve water status.
For surface water, good water is to be defined in terms of ecological quality, which takes into account the water body’s biology,
chemistry and physical features. For groundwater, it includes quantitative status. It was agreed in 2000 and the framework for
delivering it was scheduled to have been rolled out in stages until December 2015, when member states were required to have
met the directive’s environmental objectives. In reality there has been confusion over the interpretation of the directive, which
was compounded by the Euro-crisis and growing political tensions between member states and the EU. This has meant that
enforcement has not been prioritised and many member states have received derogations from compliance. When and if the
EU recovers from its current political and financial weakness the WFD would become a major driver of the market for water
technologies and services in Europe, not least because it enshrines the concepts of cost recovery and polluter pays in legislation,
guaranteeing the financial basis of the water sector within Europe.
The third area of risk applies to heavy water users in industries such as mining, energy, and pulp & paper which rely on the
goodwill of the communities where they work for their licence to operate. This requires them to burnish their reputation for good
water stewardship. An example of the cost of failure is the Tia Maria copper mine in Arequipa, Peru. Southern Copper was given
the go ahead to develop the mine, but it ran into voluble protests from the local community in which three people died. Their
claim was that the mine would deplete and pollute local water systems. In 2014, the government agreed a new environmental
impact assessment with the company which failed to win over the protest movement. The mine, despite containing
641 million tonnes of copper, has yet to begin operations.
These incidents have raised the profile of water on the corporate agenda. In 2015 and 2016 water was rated to be the number one
global risk in the World Economic Forum’s Global Risk Report. Investors are also expressing concern, backing initiatives such as
the CDP Water Project to ensure better corporate disclosure of water risk.
Some water technology vendors report that much of the corporate water stewardship activity is essentially greenwash, and
that businesses still expect to apply the same financial metrics to investment in water systems as they would to other areas
of a plant (that is to say an 18-month, two-year payback period is still required regardless of the impact on water usage and
the environment). However, it has definitely become easier for water technology companies to access decision makers in the
corporate sector to discuss water services, and where technology can offer a strong return on investment (for example where
value from waste propositions are available), vendors are enjoying strong market growth.
Customers Assets/
Other utility (million) Assets Revenues revenues Assets/customer Revenue/customer Notes
SSE 9 $50,944m $34,515m 1.5 $5,924 $4,013 Multi-utility
PG&E 16 $63,339m $16,833m 3.8 $3,959 $1,052 Gas and electricity
EDF 39 $302,930m $83,209m 3.6 $7,868 $2,161 Electricity
AT&T 167 $402,672m $146,801m 2.7 $2,418 $882 Mobile and broadband
Verizon 125 $244,640m $131,620m 1.9 $1,959 $1,054 Mobile and broadband
Source: Annual Reports
Despite the fact that water utilities require a lot of capex compared to the revenues they generate, there remains strong interest
in water utilities among private investors. Investor-owned utilities trade on price earnings ratios in excess of 20, whereas other
utilities typically trade in the region of 13. This reflects the relative scarcity of investor-owned utilities compared to energy and
telecoms companies, but it also reflects the fact that water utilities enjoy a much lower degree of volatility of earnings than either
energy or telecoms.
This data from investor-owned utilities gives a somewhat distorted view of the sector as a whole. Less than 2% of the world’s
population are served by investor-owned utilities. Most utilities are publicly owned and the vast majority are not expected to
recover a return on their capital employed through tariff revenue. It means that the ratio of assets to revenues is even higher,
although many utilities do not have their own balance sheets separate from their government or municipal owners.
Over the past decade water tariffs have been increasing steadily ahead of inflation. Globally the price of water rose by 4.3%
between 2014 and 2015, according to the 2015 GWI Global Water Tariff Survey, however there were large regional disparities.
The Latin America and Caribbean region led the way, with average growth of 9.7%, while sub-Saharan Africa and North
America advanced by 6.2% and 4.8%, respectively. By contrast, the Asia-Pacific region showed much slower growth, at just 2.0%,
while the average domestic tariff in the Middle East and North Africa was once again held back by rate cuts in Israel, dropping by
0.8%. Regional trends are shown in the following figure:
4.00 Global
North America
3.50
Latin America & Caribbean
Average combined tariff ($/m3)
Besides water tariffs, utilities also charge connection charges to new customers which serve to offset the costs involved. These are
less politically sensitive than tariffs on water usage, largely because they are typically paid for by real estate developers. In many
cases utilities are able to charge more than the direct cost of linking a new household to the mains. They can ask for additional
“capital contributions” from real estate developers which are supposed to cover the broader costs of expanding the water system.
IB-Net records the following data for average connection charges for the regions it covers:
$3.00
Australia
Kuwait
$2.50
Czech Republic
Norway
SUBSIDY
$2.00 Portugal
Operating cost/m³ delivered
Bahrain
Poland
$1.50
Colombia Korea
Russia
South Africa Kenya
Turkey
$1.00 Romania
Palestine
Brazil
Jordan
COST RECOVERY
Congo Uganda
Nigeria Chile
Mexico
Kazakhstan
Tunisia
$0.50 Algeria Senegal
Peru Ukraine
Pakistan China
Philippines
India Malaysia
Indonesia Egypt Bolivia
$0.00
$0.00 $0.50 $1.00 $1.50 $2.00 $2.50 $3.00 $3.50 $4.00 $5.30
Revenue/m³ sold
Source: IB-Net/GWI
More detailed country-by-country costs and revenues are shown in the following figure. The green column shows the average
revenue per cubic metre of water sold. It is topped by a light green shaded bar representing the cost of non-revenue water (i.e.
water which is produced but not billed). The costs column is divided into different shades of brown/orange representing the cost
breakdown per cubic metre of water sold. Not all utilities in the IB-Net database report the details of each cost element. We have
used what detail is available and where detail is not available, we have simply referred to it as “other” costs. The utilities which
report this data in detail are somewhat self-selecting and therefore the figures possibly show a better picture than is in fact the
case. Furthermore Western Europe, North America and Japan generally do not participate in IB-Net.
Figure 1.19 Utility water and wastewater costs and revenues per cubic metre sold
Cost / Revenue ($/m³) Cost / Revenue ($/m³)
0.00 1.00 2.00 3.00 4.00 0.00 1.00 2.00 3.00 4.00
Afghanistan Labour Malaysia
Albania Electricity Mali
Argentina Contracted services
Mauritania
Other costs
Armenia Mauritius
Average revenue
Azerbaijan Mexico
Cost of NRW
Bahrain Moldova
Bangladesh Mongolia
Belarus Montenegro
Benin Mozambique
Bolivia Namibia
Bosnia Nicaragua
Brazil Niger
Bulgaria Nigeria
Burkina Faso Norway
Burundi Pakistan
Cambodia Panama
Chile
Papua New Guinea
China
Peru
Colombia
Philippines
Costa Rica
Poland
Cote dIvoire
Romania
Croatia
Russia
Czech Republic
Senegal
Ecuador
Serbia
Egypt
Slovakia
El Salvador
South Africa
Ethiopia
Sri Lanka
Gabon
Sudan
Georgia
Swaziland
Guinea
Tajikistan
Honduras
Tanzania
Hungary
India The Gambia
Indonesia Togo
Jordan Tonga
Kazakhstan Tunisia
Kenya Turkey
Kosovo Uganda
Kuwait Ukraine
Kyrgyz Republic United States
Lao PDR Uruguay
Lesotho Uzbekistan
Liberia Venezuela
Lithuania Vietnam
Macau, China West Bank and Gaza
Macedonia, FYR Yemen
Malawi Zambia
$0.00 $1.00 $2.00 $3.00 $4.00 $0.00 $1.00 $2.00 $3.00 $4.00
Source: IB-Net/GWI
Where costs are not met through utility billings they are typically met by government subsidy and other transfers. The lack
of utility control over this support means that utility expenditure needs rarely match the revenues available. In that sense the
institutional structure of the utility sector is an important driver of growth.
Most of these institutions report increased lending to the water sector over time ahead of inflation. The World Bank, for example,
lent an average of $3.1 billion a year for water, sanitation and flood protection projects between 2006 and 2010, but it lent an
average of $3.9 billion a year to the same category during the 2011–2015 period. This might reflect an annual growth rate of
4.6%.
Besides the main international development finance institutions, there are a number of bilateral agencies active in water. The
most prominent are: the Japan Bank for International Cooperation, which provides concessional finance for water projects where
Japanese companies have some involvement; the Japan International Cooperation Agency which provides overseas development
assistance to developing countries in the form of grants and loans; Germany’s Kreditanstalt für Wiederaufbau (KfW) which
acts as a development bank offering concessional loans alongside GIZ which offers technical assistance to developing countries;
Korea’s KEXIM Bank which provides loans to support water projects where Korean companies are involved; and, US AID which
offers loans and grants to support international development. Other bilateral agencies more committed to grant finance in the
water sector include: SIDA (Sweden), DFID (UK), AFD (France), and the Netherland Development Cooperation.
Other significant institutions (both of which are part of the World Bank Group) are the International Finance Corporation which
provides debt, equity and hybrid finance to private companies developing water infrastructure in emerging markets, and the
Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency which provides political risk insurance for water projects in developing countries.
The most significant recent development in the development banking sector has been the creation of the Asian Infrastructure
Development Bank by the Chinese government (although supported by other countries in the region and several European
governments). The bank has yet to begin operations in the water sector. Its focus will be Asia and Oceania, but it is expected to
complement China’s One Belt – One Road economic strategy which focuses on countries along the old Silk Road.
Figure 1.23 Sources of finance for water and wastewater infrastructure 2006–2020
300,000
250,000
200,000
$ million
150,000
100,000
ODA funded
50,000 Tax payer funded
Self funded
0
2006 2008 2010 2012 2014 2016 2018 2020
Source: GWI
Shrinking government surpluses and increased budget deficits have also had the impact of opening out the market for private
finance in water. Since 2012, governments including the US, Nigeria, Rwanda, Kenya, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Mexico, and Indonesia
have been looking for ways to encourage private finance in water. In most cases this means looking at ways of attracting private
investors to own and operate water assets on a BOT basis rather than selling water utilities to the private sector. This reflects the
fact that outright water sector privatisation is still politically sensitive, but asset finance is less controversial.
The outlook for private finance in water in discussed in more detail in section 1.5.
At the other end of the market, among small- and medium-sized enterprises, we have seen greater government assistance for
private businesses in reaching the international market. Around 15 countries and a further 20 or so regions and cities have
internationally focused water sector strategies for economic development. Between them they have six main components, and
two common objectives, but no two strategies and objectives are directly alike.
The main institutional approaches are:
• Water clusters/innovation hubs (e.g. Singapore Hydrohub, Toronto WaterTAP, Milwaukee Water Council)
• Water partnerships (e.g. NWP, German Water Partnership, US Water Partnership)
• Export development agency activity (e.g. US ITC, UKTI, JETO)
• Research commercialisation bodies (Wetsus Institute, Southern Ontario Water Consortium)
The following figure summarises the strategies involved:
SECTOR
COORDINATION
1. Accelerated development of
an export-led water industry
Source: GWI
Utility
capital expenditure
By project type
DesalData forecast
Technology
forecast
Industrial
By industry
capital expenditure Equipment
forecast
Source: GWI
A global summary of our forecast can be found in section 1.4. Country-level forecasts for each sector, technology, equipment
category, and chemical type can be found at the end of each country chapter, and in the spreadsheets that accompany this report.
In the following sections, we discuss the methodology used for the different areas of our forecast shown in the preceding figure.
We have divided our analysis of industrial operating expenditure into seven segments:
• Water purchases and wastewater utility charges: This includes payments to municipal utilities for water supply and
wastewater discharge. To estimate this, we have made assumptions about the percentage of utility revenue from
industrial customers. We have not included this segment in our overall forecast of industrial spending because of the
overlap with operating expenditure in the utility sector.
• Labour: This includes payments to people directly employed by the industrial user. We have made assumptions
about the percentage of total operating costs that go towards labour, as well as the likelihood that this would be
in-house or outsourced.
• Energy: This includes the electricity and fuel costs required for treatment operations and for moving water around
industrial facilities. We have made assumptions about the energy required per unit volume of water, and the typical
cost of energy.
• Parts and consumables: This includes the cost of replacement equipment and consumables such as membranes, ion
exchange resins, and activated carbon. These estimates are also included in our forecast of equipment spending (see
section 1.4.6). For each sector and equipment category, we have considered the typical proportion of sales that come
from replacement parts.
• Chemicals: This includes the cost of chemicals required for process water treatment, wastewater treatment, internal
boiler and cooling system conditioning, and other uses such as dust suppression. For more information, see
section 1.4.7.
• Outsourced operations and services: This includes spending on outsourced operations contracts, payments under
BOT contracts, equipment maintenance contracts, services related to the supply of chemicals and consumables,
mobile water solutions and other specialist services. In this report, we do not break out spending under each type of
contract. For a more detailed forecast, please see our Industrial Water Services & Chemicals report.
• Oil & gas water management services: This includes the cost of water sourcing for hydraulic fracturing, transport
and storage of produced water, treatment of fracturing fluid, flowback water and produced water, and disposal of
produced water in deep wells. Our estimate of spending on these services is based on our forecast of produced water
volumes and demand for water for hydraulic fracturing in North America. We have then considered the typical unit
of cost of such services to estimate the total level of spending in the industry.
information about individual projects, and in some cases, references of installations that we have collected from technology
suppliers.
The treatment applications that we have used in our analysis include:
Wastewater treatment Utility wastewater treatment plants and systems for treating wastewater at industrial sites, including
systems for wastewater reuse and sludge management. The most significant area of spending for this
application is for biological treatment technologies.
Produced water treatment Systems for separating water from hydrocarbons in the upstream oil and gas industry, and for removing oil
from wastewater in the refining industry. The largest area of spending is for oil-water separators at the well
site.
Source: GWI
Dissolved solids removal This includes reverse osmosis/nanofiltration systems, thermal desalination equipment, ion exchange,
electrodialysis/deionisation, activated carbon, brine concentration, etc.
Biological treatment Any technology that uses biological methods to reduce organic carbon or nutrient levels. We have included
aerobic, anoxic and anaerobic methods, and both free-film and fixed film technologies.
Disinfection Systems using chlorination, ultraviolet light, ozonation, and advanced oxidation to inhibit the growth of
microorganisms and oxidise organic compounds.
Sludge management Technologies for managing and reducing the volume of sludge that is produced by other treatment
processes, such as gravity thickeners, belt thickeners, filter presses, anaerobic digestion, chemical
stabilisation, composting, etc.
Source: GWI
We have also considered spending on other equipment and areas that do not directly fit into one of these categories. This
includes spending on intake structures and discharge points (in the category ‘intakes/outfalls’), and general water-related
spending at project sites (in the category ‘General construction/other’).
• Activated carbon: Includes any systems and technologies for the removal of trace contaminants by adsorption
processes. We have considered the initial system to be a capital expense and the cost of replacement carbon or
regeneration to be an operating expense.
• Disinfection: Includes all systems and equipment for disinfection and oxidation of water and wastewater, such
as storage, delivery and control for chlorination systems, UV disinfection systems, ozonation systems, advanced
oxidation systems, etc. Does not include contact tanks or bulk delivery facilities.
• Chemical feed systems: Includes all systems and equipment for chemical storage, delivery and control. Does not
include contact tanks, or chlorination/biocide feed systems (which are included in Disinfection).
• Sludge thickening/dewatering: Includes all equipment whose purpose is thickening and dewatering the sludge
produced by other treatment processes, such as gravity thickeners, belt thickeners, rotary drum thickeners, flotation
thickeners, centrifuges, vacuum filtration, filter presses, etc.
• Sludge drying/thermal processes: Includes all equipment and systems for thermal treatment of sludge, such as
incineration, wet air oxidation, supercritical water oxidation, pyrolysis, gasification, pasteurisation, etc. Does not
include facilities for offsite co-incineration of sludge with other solid waste, or similar systems that are used for water
and wastewater.
• Anaerobic digestion: Includes all configurations of anaerobic digestion system, as well as any advanced technology
or pretreatment system that will enhance biogas yield, such as thermal hydrolysis, enzymic hydrolysis, ultrasonic
disintegration, high pressure disintegration, etc. Does not include anaerobic wastewater treatment systems.
• Other sludge stabilisation: Includes any other equipment and systems used to stabilise and reduce the volume of
sludge, such as chemical stabilisation, aerobic digestion, and composting. Does not include equipment for anaerobic
digestion or pasteurisation, or systems for treating wastewater.
• Meters: Includes any device for measuring the flow of water to residential and commercial connections, and
equipment needed at the connection for automated meter reading. Does not include other devices for measuring the
flow of water in networks (these are included in Sensors) or storage and communication systems which use data from
automated meters (these are included in Automation/control)
• Sensors: Includes any device for measuring the flow or quality of water in networks, treatment plants or industrial
facilities, such as flow meters, turbidity sensors, pressure sensors, etc. Does not include meters on customer
connections (which are include in Meters), laboratory equipment (which is included in Testing/analysis) or data
storage and communication equipment (which is included in Automation/control).
• Testing/analysis: Includes laboratory water quality analytical, monitoring and testing systems for use by utilities and
industrial water users. Does not include analytical systems used to test other fluids and solutions in industrial and
research laboratories.
• Automation/control: Includes any system that controls utility and industrial water operations and any system that
collects and processes data. On the operational side this includes SCADA systems, centralised manual control
systems, electrical control panels, PLCs, sensors, and any other non-mechanical elements of the control system. We
have also included systems and software associated with customer service, accounting, enterprise managements,
hydrological modelling, asset management, leak detection, etc. This does not include general electrical work, water
quality testing equipment, customer meters or monitoring devices.
• Other equipment: Includes any water-related equipment that does not fit into one of the above categories, such as
storage tanks, contact tanks, weirs, pressure vessels, racking, etc. plus a contingency allowance. Does not include
non-water specific items such as walkways, stairs, handrails, etc.
We have also considered spending in three areas of non-equipment spending. They are:
• Design and engineering: Includes any costs related to project design and engineering for treatment plant, network
and industrial projects. Does not include engineering costs related to sitework or construction.
• Civil engineering/fabrication: Includes labour, installation costs and generic materials (such as concrete, steel or
cables) involved in treatment plant and network projects. For industrial projects this includes labour, installation
costs and generic materials associated with water and wastewater treatment systems, as wells as custom metal
fabricated industrial process equipment. Does not include water-specific equipment and materials such as pipes
that are listed above. In industrial projects, this does not include general civil engineering and construction costs at
project sites.
• Regulatory and professional costs: Includes the cost of any legal and financial services on a project, as well as services
related to environmental permits for water withdrawals and discharges.
120,000
150,000
90,000
$ million
$ million
100,000
60,000
50,000
30,000
0 0
2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020
Water treatment plants Water distribution networks Wastewater treatment plants Wastewater networks
300,000 225,000
250,000
200,000
200,000
$ million
$ million
175,000
150,000
150,000
100,000
50,000 125,000
0 100,000
2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020
Utility Industrial Utility water Utility wastewater Industrial
25,000
4,000
20,000
3,000
$ million
$ million
15,000
2,000
10,000
1,000
5,000
0 0
2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020
Seawater Brackish water
Coagulants / flocculants Biocides pH control
Source: GWI
Utility capex by project (2016) $235,325m Industrial capex by industry (2016) $20,274m
Water resources 7.4% Upstream oil & gas 12.9%
Water networks 24.6% Refining & petrochemicals 3.6%
Water treatment 11.6% Power generation 12.1%
Desalination 1.2% Mining 5.6%
Wastewater networks 33.0% Food & beverage 23.2%
Wastewater treatment 22.2% Pulp & paper 2.7%
Pharmaceuticals 3.9%
Total capex by technology (2016) $255,599m Microelectronics 5.9%
Oil-water separation 0.8% Other 30.1%
Suspended solids 9.8%
Dissolved solids 1.5% Total opex by segment (2016) $458,317m
Biological treatment 7.2% Labour 35.0%
Disinfection 2.1% Energy 11.5%
Sludge management 4.0% Parts & consumables 5.3%
Intakes / outfalls 4.2% Chemicals 5.1%
General construction / other 10.5% Third party services 13.9%
Water resources 6.8% Oil & gas water services 6.3%
Water networks 22.7% Other 22.9%
Wastewater networks 30.4%
Total equipment sales (2016) $143,712m Total chemical sales (2016) $23,350m
Screens 2.4% Coagulants / flocculants 50.5%
Standard process equipment 3.2% Biocides 15.5%
Aeration 2.5% pH control 5.4%
Non-membrane filtration 2.2% Scale inhibitors 13.3%
Disinfection & chem feeds 3.7% Corrosion inhibitors 12.8%
A&C / test / meters 15.2% Other 2.5%
MF / UF 0.3%
RO / NF 0.6%
Sludge 4.2%
Other / specialist 19.9%
Note: Total equipment sales excludes civil engineering,
Pipes, pumps & valves 46.0% design and regulatory costs, which are included in total capex.
Source: GWI
Capital expenditure by technology ($m) 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020
Oil-water separation 2,997.8 3,303.0 1,966.5 1,930.5 2,001.1 2,241.3 2,716.6 3,148.0
Suspended solids removal 24,500.9 23,988.6 24,298.9 25,160.8 26,470.4 27,837.3 29,195.2 30,712.2
Dissolved solids removal 4,447.0 4,038.3 3,809.2 3,954.7 4,203.5 4,760.9 5,203.7 5,569.4
Biological treatment 17,332.4 17,368.7 17,811.1 18,364.1 19,205.7 20,238.9 21,291.0 22,466.4
Disinfection 5,263.1 5,083.5 5,168.2 5,336.9 5,605.9 5,863.0 6,135.8 6,437.5
Sludge management 8,864.8 9,217.1 9,828.3 10,337.9 10,978.6 11,687.0 12,212.5 12,912.7
Total technologies 63,405.9 62,999.1 62,882.2 65,084.9 68,465.1 72,628.3 76,754.8 81,246.3
Intakes / outfalls 10,764.6 10,367.0 10,426.1 10,795.5 11,360.8 12,099.7 12,796.3 13,464.8
General construction / other 26,005.1 25,836.2 25,779.9 26,730.6 28,220.0 30,118.6 31,961.3 33,891.8
Networks & resources 148,829.5 144,660.0 146,896.3 152,988.0 161,344.6 170,864.5 179,690.6 190,323.4
Total capital expenditure 249,005.2 243,862.3 245,984.4 255,599.0 269,390.5 285,711.1 301,203.0 318,926.3
Operating expenditure by sector ($m) 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020
Utility water 188,041.2 191,369.9 195,633.7 200,638.6 205,030.8 210,276.4 215,764.1 221,988.9
Utility wastewater 132,493.0 136,278.7 140,026.1 144,481.1 149,814.1 154,063.3 161,228.2 166,002.4
Industrial 109,443.9 113,987.1 112,467.9 113,197.0 114,253.5 117,200.8 121,825.5 127,191.2
Total operating expenditure 429,978.1 441,635.6 448,127.6 458,316.6 469,098.4 481,540.5 498,817.9 515,182.6
Operating expenditure by segment ($m) 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020
Labour (in-house services) 149,007.1 152,367.7 156,116.0 160,396.8 164,733.6 168,903.4 174,231.8 178,952.9
Energy 48,061.1 49,392.8 50,921.2 52,864.1 54,800.3 56,722.8 58,999.9 61,252.8
Parts & consumables 22,629.4 23,189.3 23,784.2 24,446.0 25,113.6 25,733.4 26,551.8 27,256.1
Chemicals 21,642.9 22,187.4 22,746.8 23,350.3 23,962.7 24,553.5 25,249.5 25,908.0
Third party services 58,962.6 60,433.9 61,867.5 63,483.9 65,339.6 67,183.0 69,494.3 71,524.6
Oil & gas water services 32,238.8 34,504.4 30,633.9 28,736.5 27,121.6 27,508.4 29,422.5 32,005.0
Other 97,436.2 99,560.1 102,058.1 105,039.1 108,027.0 110,936.1 114,868.1 118,283.2
Total operating expenditure 429,978.1 441,635.6 448,127.6 458,316.6 469,098.4 481,540.5 498,817.9 515,182.6
Equipment: opex and capex ($m) 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020
Pipes 40,099.3 40,250.5 41,127.6 42,877.8 45,003.0 47,224.3 49,454.8 51,958.6
Pumps 15,435.4 15,093.9 15,238.1 15,747.5 16,512.0 17,430.7 18,327.3 19,291.2
Valves 7,133.9 7,029.3 7,135.8 7,416.5 7,788.7 8,216.7 8,641.6 9,100.4
Screens 3,314.3 3,240.1 3,275.0 3,389.9 3,560.1 3,773.4 3,975.6 4,173.0
Agitation / Mixing / Settling 4,384.1 4,345.4 4,407.9 4,545.6 4,763.4 5,001.1 5,251.5 5,520.8
Aeration 3,280.1 3,331.1 3,456.4 3,583.9 3,756.3 3,951.3 4,157.8 4,383.7
Gas flotation 1,552.1 1,534.9 1,568.8 1,633.4 1,716.2 1,799.6 1,882.7 1,973.5
Oil-water separation 3,838.7 4,168.4 2,850.8 2,828.3 2,908.5 3,150.6 3,630.7 4,067.2
Non-membrane filtration 3,048.1 3,023.3 3,039.1 3,147.0 3,304.9 3,475.0 3,647.4 3,832.4
Low pressure membranes (MF/UF) 373.9 366.1 367.7 395.6 425.9 460.7 486.4 513.2
High pressure membranes (RO/NF) 984.2 927.6 857.7 888.7 976.6 1,086.2 1,174.3 1,254.4
Thermal desalination equipment 379.0 335.6 305.7 357.7 373.8 429.7 439.3 504.7
Ion exchange 573.7 582.9 579.9 587.8 608.2 637.0 659.6 686.8
ED / EDI 117.4 124.4 129.1 134.7 146.2 155.7 165.4 177.2
Activated carbon 257.1 259.4 265.7 273.4 282.3 291.0 301.7 312.0
Disinfection 2,910.8 2,844.5 2,892.7 2,988.5 3,136.1 3,277.6 3,425.7 3,589.4
Chemical feed systems 2,207.0 2,197.9 2,201.8 2,277.0 2,391.0 2,522.4 2,656.4 2,799.4
Sludge thickening / dewatering 2,225.4 2,267.2 2,361.2 2,279.7 2,368.3 2,479.5 2,562.2 2,669.8
Sludge drying / thermal processes 1,312.3 1,367.1 1,457.5 1,541.8 1,628.8 1,722.6 1,806.1 1,906.6
Anaerobic digestion 799.3 850.1 921.3 1,065.7 1,147.3 1,235.5 1,308.4 1,398.3
Other sludge stabilisation 890.7 949.8 1,015.0 1,157.0 1,247.6 1,342.2 1,416.6 1,516.8
Meters 4,021.6 4,071.7 4,281.1 4,597.7 4,789.5 4,957.3 5,121.5 5,322.4
Sensors 3,030.2 2,965.0 2,987.5 3,088.0 3,240.2 3,411.1 3,585.3 3,768.6
Testing / Analysis 2,129.2 2,033.3 2,020.8 2,080.1 2,180.8 2,317.0 2,448.8 2,578.1
Automation / control 10,935.5 10,963.8 11,379.2 12,049.4 12,917.9 13,855.2 14,806.2 15,876.7
Other equipment 22,089.9 21,725.4 21,991.8 22,779.0 23,937.7 25,354.8 26,718.6 28,177.6
Total equipment 137,323.2 136,848.8 138,115.3 143,711.9 151,111.1 159,558.1 168,052.0 177,352.8
Design and engineering 17,571.4 17,174.1 17,360.0 18,045.1 19,051.5 20,248.0 21,381.0 22,669.9
Civil engineering / fabrication 114,057.4 110,843.5 112,186.1 116,211.1 122,174.5 129,280.8 135,800.7 143,477.1
Regulatory & professional costs 2,682.6 2,185.1 2,107.2 2,076.8 2,166.9 2,357.6 2,521.1 2,682.7
Total expenditure 271,634.6 267,051.5 269,768.7 280,045.0 294,504.1 311,444.5 327,754.8 346,182.5
Chemicals: utility and industrial ($m) 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020
Coagulants / flocculants 10,916.7 11,185.2 11,468.2 11,782.8 12,100.7 12,405.7 12,785.4 13,129.9
Biocides 3,369.8 3,448.3 3,533.7 3,628.3 3,721.5 3,814.9 3,923.9 4,029.8
pH Control 1,154.7 1,186.3 1,217.7 1,250.4 1,283.6 1,315.4 1,351.0 1,385.9
Corrosion inhibitors 2,778.1 2,855.1 2,926.7 2,998.9 3,075.6 3,148.9 3,228.0 3,307.4
Scale inhibitors 2,885.4 2,960.4 3,034.6 3,110.3 3,187.7 3,261.7 3,340.5 3,420.3
Other 538.2 552.0 565.9 579.6 593.6 606.8 620.7 634.8
Total 21,642.9 22,187.4 22,746.8 23,350.3 23,962.7 24,553.5 25,249.5 25,908.0
Source: GWI