Techniques for reducing planned Customer Minutes Lost

Most drinking water companies have large-scale replacement projects as do other network operators, such as gas and sewer owners. Even though the companies strive to work together to minimize some nuisance for the customers and the public, these projects inevitably involve nuisance such as disruptions to supply. As the number of replacement projects is expected to increase over the next decades due to the ageing networks this type of nuisance as well as the total replacement costs are expected to increase.
The drinking water companies look for innovations that keep the nuisance for customers within acceptable limits while keeping the costs at the same level or lower. Preferably, new techniques are sought that reduce both nuisance and costs.
An important nuisance is the interruption of supply, expressed as customer minutes lost (CML). CML is influenced by the number of disruption events, duration of disruption events and number of affected customers. This report focuses on the reduction of planned CML (due to planned maintenance and rehabilitation) by shortening the duration of events or the number of affected customers.