Abstract
Recent studies in water supply in Enugu urban area have observed that there is a persistent water supply shortage relative to demand. One of the strategies for achieving a good water supply under the circumstance is through efficient water allocation to consumers. The existing allocation system by the Enugu State Water Corporation is not achieving the desired goal, because it is not based on any scientific criteria. In this study, we have employed the linear programming modelling technique to optimise the allocation of 35,000,000 L of water produced daily by the State Water Corporation and supplied to the four sectors of the town. The result shows that the model allocated 27,470,000 L to the residential sector, 3,360,000 L to commercial, 3,120,000 L to industrial and 882,000 L to public institutions sectors leaving a balance of 168,000 L to be utilised in emergency situations. This allocation pattern departs sharply from the present management technique adopted by the corporation. It is then suggested that for urban water supply to be sustainable in the town, the corporation should rely on this technique for water supply.
Highlights
Recent studies on urban water demand and supply in Nigeria are replete with findings of the wide gap between water demand and supply (Obeta 1997: Nnodu and Ilo 2001; Ezenwaji 2003; Uzoagbala 2006)
The result shows that the model allocated 27,470,000 L to the residential sector, 3,360,000 L to commercial, 3,120,000 L to industrial and 882,000 L to public institutions sectors leaving a balance of 168,000 L to be utilised in emergency situations
The thrust of arguments of the supporters of this outlined allocation method is that each method should be used to address the problem based on the peculiarity of an area provided that such a method should not result in generous assumptions about demand growth with the possible effect of chronically overestimating the supply
Summary
Recent studies on urban water demand and supply in Nigeria are replete with findings of the wide gap between water demand and supply (Obeta 1997: Nnodu and Ilo 2001; Ezenwaji 2003; Uzoagbala 2006) Some of these and other works have suggested that one of the best ways to solve this problem of water scarcity in urban areas is to devise a better strategy for allocating the available supply to consumers. In Enugu Urban area, the State Water Corporation employs what it terms the administrative method approach in the allocation of water supply to consumers. This is the estimation of water demand based on past consumption data, i.e. on established records of water consumption of each area or sector.
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