How Esporles has curbed the conflict over water between those who use too much and those who have none

PalmaHomes located in the highest part of the Rotgetes and Jardín de Flores developments turned on the tap and, in some cases, not a single drop of water came out. Meanwhile, other homes in the area were consuming up to 8,000 liters of water in a single day. This is the situation that forced the Esporles City Council to adopt unprecedented restrictions to ensure the distribution of an increasingly scarce resource.

The first data indicate that the measures have had an almost immediate effect. Of the five roads that had serious supply problems, four have already returned to normal and the fifth has improved significantly. "The situation from last week to now is a progressive improvement. Every day we have had more information and this has allowed us to take corrective measures," summarizes the mayor of Esporles, Josep Ferrà.

The information has arrived thanks to the new digital meters. Until now, consumption could only be known when an operator manually read the meters every three months. By the time the data arrived, the problem had already occurred. Now, however, telemetry allows the consumption of each dwelling to be monitored practically in real time. This system generates an automatic alarm when a dwelling exceeds the established limit –340 liters per day per person– and allows immediate action. The City Council does not automatically sanction high consumption, but rather studies each case for two or three weeks to verify whether it is a one-off consumption, such as filling a cistern, or a habitual use far exceeding the permitted limit.

A network strained by a minority

Thanks to this system, municipal services detected homes that exceeded 6,000 liters in just twelve hoursand a household that reached 8,000 liters in a single day. Some owners have justified these peaks because they took advantage of the recovery of the supply to fill private tanks after several days without water; in other cases, the City Council has also detected leaks or automatic irrigation systems that continued to operate.

According to municipal data, between 10% and 20% of homes concentrate the highest consumptions, mainly related to swimming pools, gardens, lawns, and the filling of cisterns. Between April and June, the overall consumption of Les Rotgetes and Jardín de Flores almost triples that of the rest of the municipality.

For now, the City Council has not imposed any sanctions or cut off supply to any home. In the first few days, it limited itself to sending notices to households that exceeded the limits and, according to Ferrà, the response was immediate. "The balance is very positive. With only half of the meters monitored, we have already recovered four of the five affected roads." The problem exclusively affects the urbanizations of Les Rotgetes and Jardín de Flores, which have an independent supply network from the rest of the municipality. "It's as if they were two different towns," explains the mayor.

This system worked with two wells, but the one with less capacity became unusable after a storm that collapsed it. Nevertheless, Josep Ferrà insists that the problem is not just the lack of infrastructure. For a large part of the year, the service works normally, and it is in the summer when demand skyrockets.

Consumption and severity

But the problem is not only the amount of water consumed, but also how it circulates through the network. The supply works by gravity: homes located in the lower parts continue to receive water while the higher streets lose pressure to the point of being practically without supply. When the City Council began to intervene, there were five affected roads: two had no water and three more suffered very low pressure. After the first restrictions, the three streets with low pressure recovered service, as did one of the two that were completely without water. Only road 9 continues to present difficulties, even though there are already homes that can fill their cisterns thanks to programmed cuts that concentrate network pressure two days a week.

Ferrà explains that some neighbors have criticized the restrictions because they believe they can consume all the water they pay for or because they reject the City Council monitoring their consumption. "They consider it an almost communist measure," he points out. But he also assures that most residents have ended up supporting the measures after recovering the supply.

The objective, the mayor insists, is not to sanction but to ensure that everyone has access to water. "When we have 100% of the meters monitored, we hope to be able to withdraw these occasional cuts and supply water normally to all homes," he states. If it is not enough, he warns, the City Council will maintain the restrictions and, if necessary, will begin to apply sanctions and supply cuts to repeat offenders.

For the Consistory, this crisis has also left a lesson for the future. Digital meters have not only served to manage an emergency, but have shown that a minority of large consumers can jeopardize the supply of an entire urbanization. Therefore, even if the situation normalizes in the fall, the Esporles City Council is considering continuing with containment measures so that, in the words of the mayor, water can reach "everyone" and not so much those who consume the most.