WATER LOSS IN NORTHWEST GEORGIA
Sources, methods and corrections
Trace a displayed value to the source workbook, worksheet and row. Downloads retain original precision and quality flags.
Download the data
89 local annual audits (CSV)Published calculations (JSON)Full audit provenance (JSON)Source hashes and integrity manifest
2019_water_audits_compiled_-_all_9-11-20.xlsxXLSX2018-Water-Audit-Compiled-Spreadsheet_Final-7-31-19.xlsxXLSXga_water_audits_cleaned.xlsxXLSX2022-Water-Audits-Final-Version-9-25-2023.xlsxXLSX2025-Water-Audits-8-27-26-FINAL.xlsxXLSX2016-Water-Audit-Compilation-11-15-18-.xlsxXLSX2021-Water-Audits-Fianal-Version-9-29-22-.xlsxXLSX2020-Water-Audit-Posting-Version-7-26-21-.xlsxXLSX2024-Water-Audits-Final_Jan2026.xlsxXLSX2023-Water-Audits-9-24-2024-10-8-2025-UPDATED10062025.xlsxXLSX2017-Validated-Water-Audit-Results.xlsxXLSXGeorgia-Water-Loss-Audits-2016-2025-Northwest-Georgia-Findings.mdMDWater-Supply-Efficiency-Improvement-EPD-Approach_GAWP-Fall-Conference-2020.pptxPPTXGuidance-for-Demonstrating-Progress-in-Improving-Water-Efficiency_July-2.._.pdfPDFGeogia-Water-Loss-Control-Manual-V3-2024-02.pdfPDFNGELOG.mdMDa-methodology.mdMDearch-backlog.mdMD
Calculations and comparison rules
- Coverage is one utility per audit year, 2016–2025. Nine local systems have 89 available observations. Ringgold 2017 is absent, not zero.
- Source volumes are million gallons. Water supplied is an adjusted audit field. It is not always a simple sum of unadjusted own-source and imported volumes minus exports.
- Water losses = supplied water minus authorized consumption. Physical leakage + apparent losses = total water losses. Non-revenue water also includes authorized unbilled consumption.
- Regional and county percentages use summed volumes. They are not averages of individual loss percentages. County classifications are audit labels, not confirmed service boundaries.
- Compiled normalized rates use a 365-day convention, including leap-year records. This reproduces the audit measure; a literal leap-year daily average would use 366.
- Statewide comparisons retain source values but exclude six documented suspect-unit rows: Eatonton-Putnam and Hinesville in 2024 and 2025, Glen of Robin Hood and South Atlantic Utilities–Bryan County in 2025. Incomplete loss/supply balances are also excluded from aggregates rather than treated as zero.
- Financial valuations are nominal as filed. Variable production and retail charges have different units. Unit shifts, financial scope and valuation-method changes limit dollar comparisons. No individual bill increase or guaranteed savings is calculated.
- Data validity describes documentation and checking of inputs. It is not a percentage-accuracy score. Historical audit software changes affect grading and interpretation.
- All source values and flags are retained in the full provenance file. The public explorer loads a smaller subset for performance.
- Third-party project announcements and governing information are independently sourced and dated, separate from the audit calculations.
Source validation: 61,602 checked original numeric cells match the cleaned dataset. This establishes transcription consistency, not the accuracy of the utility’s instruments or estimates.
Technical methodology and validation report · Machine-readable validation results.
Available fields and interpretation
| Field | Label | Units | Display role | Meaning / limitations |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| year | Year | integer | Source / methodological metadata | Calendar year covered by the audit, not the workbook publication date. |
| county | County | text | Source / methodological metadata | Normalized service county from the cleaned workbook. |
| utility | Utility | text | Source / methodological metadata | Normalized utility name used for display and longitudinal comparison. |
| entity_id | Entity id | text | Source / methodological metadata | Cleaned longitudinal utility identifier; source WSID inconsistencies are preserved separately. |
| wsid_raw | Wsid raw | text | Source / methodological metadata | Water-system identifier as supplied by the cleaned source transcription. |
| name_raw | Name raw | text | Source / methodological metadata | Original utility name transcribed into the cleaned workbook. |
| county_raw | County raw | text | Source / methodological metadata | Original service-county wording transcribed into the cleaned workbook. |
| audit_software | Audit software | text | Source / methodological metadata | Audit layout/software generation identified by the cleaned workbook. |
| population | Population | count | Interpretation limited by inputs / suitability | Reported population served; population changes may reflect scope or data-entry differences. |
| vol_own_sources | Vol own sources | million gallons/year | Utility profile / advanced exploration | Reported production from the utility's own sources before audit meter-error adjustments. |
| water_imported | Water imported | million gallons/year | Utility profile / advanced exploration | Reported volume purchased or received from other systems. |
| water_exported | Water exported | million gallons/year | Utility profile / advanced exploration | Reported volume sold or supplied to other systems. |
| water_supplied | Water supplied | million gallons/year | Essential public findings | Audited supply after exports and source-meter adjustments; do not reconstruct from unadjusted input volumes. |
| billed_metered | Billed metered | million gallons/year | Utility profile / advanced exploration | Authorized metered consumption for which customers were billed. |
| billed_unmetered | Billed unmetered | million gallons/year | Utility profile / advanced exploration | Authorized unmetered consumption for which customers were billed. |
| unbilled_metered | Unbilled metered | million gallons/year | Utility profile / advanced exploration | Authorized metered consumption for which no bill was issued. |
| unbilled_unmetered | Unbilled unmetered | million gallons/year | Utility profile / advanced exploration | Authorized unmetered consumption for which no bill was issued. |
| authorized_consumption | Authorized consumption | million gallons/year | Utility profile / advanced exploration | Total billed and unbilled authorized consumption reported by the audit. |
| water_losses | Water losses | million gallons/year | Essential public findings | Reported total apparent plus real losses; excludes authorized unbilled use. |
| apparent_losses | Apparent losses | million gallons/year | Essential public findings | Reported metering inaccuracies, unauthorized consumption and data handling losses. |
| real_losses | Real losses | million gallons/year | Essential public findings | Physical leakage reported in the audit; a measured/estimated audit quantity, not guaranteed recoverable water. |
| nrw_volume | Nrw volume | million gallons/year | Essential public findings | Water supplied minus billed consumption; includes unbilled authorized consumption and water losses. |
| miles_of_main | Miles of main | miles | Utility profile / advanced exploration | Reported length of distribution mains. |
| service_connections | Service connections | count | Utility profile / advanced exploration | Reported active and inactive service connections; denominator for per-connection rates. |
| avg_pressure_psi | Avg pressure psi | psi | Utility profile / advanced exploration | Reported average distribution-system operating pressure. |
| total_annual_operating_cost | Total annual operating cost | USD/year (nominal) | Utility profile / advanced exploration | Reported annual cost of operating the water system, without inflation adjustment. |
| retail_unit_cost | Retail unit cost | USD/1,000 gallons | Utility profile / advanced exploration | Reported customer retail unit cost; distinguish its thousand-gallon unit from VPC. |
| variable_production_cost | Variable production cost | USD/million gallons | Utility profile / advanced exploration | Reported marginal production unit cost used for VPC real-loss valuation. |
| real_loss_valued_at | Real loss valued at | text | Utility profile / advanced exploration | VPC = variable production cost; CRUC = customer retail unit cost. |
| uarl | Uarl | million gallons/year | Utility profile / advanced exploration | Reported unavoidable annual real losses; theoretical audit benchmark, not a guaranteed attainable target. |
| cost_apparent_losses | Cost apparent losses | USD/year (nominal) | Utility profile / advanced exploration | Reported annual apparent-loss valuation, generally using the retail unit cost. |
| cost_real_losses | Cost real losses | USD/year (nominal) | Utility profile / advanced exploration | Reported annual real-loss valuation using the stated VPC or CRUC basis. |
| cost_nrw | Cost nrw | USD/year (nominal) | Utility profile / advanced exploration | Reported annual non-revenue-water cost where present in newer source layouts; null otherwise. |
| ili | Ili | score | Interpretation limited by inputs / suitability | Reported Infrastructure Leakage Index; interpret with ili_reliable and quality_flags. |
| ili_reliable | Ili reliable | boolean | Utility profile / advanced exploration | Cleaned-workbook applicability flag; does not guarantee accuracy. |
| data_validity_score | Data validity score | score | Utility profile / advanced exploration | Audit validity score; not a direct leakage measurement. |
| rep_real_gal_conn_day | Rep real gal conn day | gallons/connection/day | Utility profile / advanced exploration | Original audit-reported real-loss per-connection rate; source N/A/footnotes may become null. |
| rep_apparent_gal_conn_day | Rep apparent gal conn day | gallons/connection/day | Utility profile / advanced exploration | Original audit-reported apparent-loss per-connection rate. |
| is_focus_county | Is focus county | boolean | Source / methodological metadata | Cleaned-workbook flag for Walker, Catoosa, Dade or Chattooga audit records. |
| exclude_from_comparisons | Exclude from comparisons | boolean | Source / methodological metadata | Cleaned-workbook exclusion retained unchanged; row still present in allRows. |
| quality_flags | Quality flags | text | Source / methodological metadata | Original cleaned-workbook quality warnings; values are not silently corrected. |
| scope_note | Scope note | text | Source / methodological metadata | Cleaned-workbook note about service-area or reporting scope. |
| footnote_codes | Footnote codes | text | Source / methodological metadata | Original nonnumeric source footnote codes paired with their mapped fields. |
| source_file | Source file | text | Source / methodological metadata | Original audit compilation filename recorded in the cleaned workbook. |
| source_sheet | Source sheet | text | Source / methodological metadata | Original workbook worksheet containing the cited audit. |
| source_row | Source row | integer | Source / methodological metadata | One-based Excel row of the original audit record. |
| real_loss_gal_conn_day | Real loss gal conn day | gallons/connection/day | Utility profile / advanced exploration | Cleaned normalized real_losses × 1,000,000 / connections / 365. |
| apparent_loss_gal_conn_day | Apparent loss gal conn day | gallons/connection/day | Utility profile / advanced exploration | Cleaned normalized apparent_losses × 1,000,000 / connections / 365. |
| real_loss_gal_mile_day | Real loss gal mile day | gallons/mile/day | Utility profile / advanced exploration | Cleaned normalized real_losses × 1,000,000 / miles of main / 365. |
| water_lost_pct_of_supplied | Water lost pct of supplied | fraction | Essential public findings | Fraction (0–1), not a displayed percent: water_losses / water_supplied. |
| nrw_pct_of_supplied | Nrw pct of supplied | fraction | Utility profile / advanced exploration | Fraction (0–1): nrw_volume / water_supplied. |
| loss_cost_total | Loss cost total | USD/year (nominal) | Utility profile / advanced exploration | Reported apparent plus real loss valuations. Nominal dollars; not a promised budget saving. |
| loss_cost_per_connection | Loss cost per connection | USD/connection/year | Interpretation limited by inputs / suitability | Cleaned combined annual loss valuation divided by service connections. |
| gal_supplied_per_person_day | Gal supplied per person day | gallons/person/day | Interpretation limited by inputs / suitability | Cleaned water_supplied × 1,000,000 / population / 365; use population warnings. |
| source_url | Source url | text | Utility profile / advanced exploration | Download path relative to the published page. |
| raw_original_row | Raw original row | array | Utility profile / advanced exploration | Every original cell, including numbers, blanks, footnotes and extra fields; column positions are one-based in sourceFieldCatalog. |
| raw_extra_notes | Raw extra notes | array | Utility profile / advanced exploration | Original text from columns 36–85, preserved for compatibility. |
| density | Density | connections/mile | Utility profile / advanced exploration | Service connections divided by miles of main. |
| day_count | Day count | integer | Utility profile / advanced exploration | 365-day audit convention, including leap years. |
| aggregate_eligible | Aggregate eligible | boolean | Utility profile / advanced exploration | All four paired supply/loss balance values are numeric; statewide totals also require no cleaned exclusion. |
| state_percentile | State percentile | percent | Utility profile / advanced exploration | Share of usable utilities in the latest audit year with an equal or lower per-connection real-loss rate. |
Public-facing essentials: supplied water, loss types, meaningful trends and stakes. Utility profiles add financial and infrastructure context. The explorer exposes technical measures; provenance downloads preserve original headers, notes and metadata. ILI flags and unusual population/cost inputs limit specific interpretations.
Corrections policy
Send documented corrections to Elliot Pierce using the current contact options on ElliotPierce.net. Include the utility, audit year, displayed figure or passage, original workbook/worksheet/row if applicable, and supporting record. A disagreement about interpretation should identify the evidence and reasoning.
Original reported values remain unchanged unless the source authority issues a correction or a verified transcription error is found. Substantive data corrections and changes in interpretation are logged separately, with dates and an explanation. The published data can be reproduced from preserved sources.
Source and interpretation updates
- October 14, 2026: Expanded public explanations, nine indexable profiles, decision-support resources, exact chart tables, peer comparisons, printable briefings and reproducible validation. No local source input silently changed.
- October 14, 2026: Historical statewide aggregation excludes incomplete loss/supply balances instead of giving missing losses a zero contribution. Details appear in the validation report.
- October 14, 2026: Added separately sourced 2026 financing developments and verified governing-resource links.