Recent Survey Results of Water Main Failures in the US and Canada

In 2018, the Utah State University's Buried Structures Laboratory published a survey of utilities across the U.S. and Canada on water main failures of municipal and private water supply systems. The primary purpose of this survey was to obtain water main break rates along with pipe inventory and related operational data. The total length of pipe covered by the survey is 170,569 miles which represents nearly 13% of the installed water mains in the U.S. and Canada. Utah State University conducted a similar survey that was published in 2012. Trends in water main break data will be observed by comparing results of these two surveys. The results of the surveys offer important insight into the number of failures utilities were experiencing and how those failures related to the pipe materials used and how pipe inventories vary on a regional basis.