Sicily is the region with the highest water loss rate nationwide, standing at 52.36%, according to a report by Istat. This figure is not only the result of the island’s typical climate, the scarcity of rainfall due to its geographic location, or frequent weather crises, but above all of an infrastructure network that, especially at the local level (provincial and municipal), displays not only limitations due to age, but also chaotic, inorganic, and uneven development over the years and, perhaps more importantly, disastrous management due to several concurrent factors: a lack of real and up-to-date data, conflicting jurisdictions, passive governance, and a lack of investment.
Evidence of a situation on the verge of collapse are the area plans of the nine provinces, which should dictate the strategic and technical planning for infrastructure management, but which instead serve as a snapshot (sometimes twenty years old) of the disaster in Sicily’s water sector. The data is very old and often merely updates from surveys from the beginning of the millennium. It is presented inconsistently and differently for each operator. Often, the reports simply note that the data is unusable or nonexistent.
(All data refers to the official area plans published by the water companies).
