Benicia has contracted with a Seattle firm to search for leaks in the city water distribution system, Graham Wadsworth, Public Works director and city engineer, said.

Utility Services Associates has begun searching for leaks in a survey that should wrap up Monday, Wadsworth said.

“Leak detection crews walk over water pipelines and use listening equipment that looks like modified metal detectors,” Wadsworth said.

Motorists who see the crews at work should use caution and drive around them, he said: “Slow for the cone zone.”

He said the city has more than 150 miles of water distribution pipeline between the Water Treatment Plant and 9,500 water meters along the conveyance system. Some of those pipelines are more than a century old.

“Once any leaks are located, they will be prioritized, and Public Works maintenance crews will make the necessary repairs,” Wadsworth said.

Utility Services Associates has worked in Benicia before, he said.

“In 2014, maintenance crews repaired over 100 water leaks, including leaks that Utility Services Associates found in the Lower Arsenal,” he said.

Most of those leaks were found when water began flowing out of the street pavement, Wadsworth said. But many more leaks exist where water travels only underground.

“Listening equipment is a cost-effective way to identify and quantify hidden water leaks,” he said.

The leak survey the company will be doing this week has become crucial to saving both water and money, particularly since Gov. Jerry Brown declared the state in its fourth year of a severe drought and has imposed the first statewide water restrictions in California’s history. Brown wants a statewide 25-percent reduction in potable urban water consumption through Feb. 28, 2016, compared to 2013 numbers.

Last year, when Benicia’s primary source of water, the State Water Project, limited the city and other contractors to 5 percent of their contracted amounts, the City Council authorized spending an additional $900,000 for water purchases.

Who bears the cost of repairing the leaks Utility Services Associates finds depends on where those leaks are found, Wadsworth said.

Municipally owned distribution lines belong to the city of Benicia, but that responsibility ends at a meter that monitors water use on private property.

“Property owners are responsible for fixing water leaks between the water meter and their home or business,” Wadsworth said. City employees already tell water customers when they see a large increase in water use, he said, because that’s an indication that there is a water leak on the customer’s side of the meter.

“By being proactive and implementing this cost-effective and efficient program, the city can repair leaks, which will reduce water loss, and can help reduce operational costs,” Wadsworth said. “Finding and repairing leaks can prevent large, costly water main breaks that interrupt water service and result in damage to both public and private property.”

For information about leak detection and to report a water leak in a city street, contact Nate Rankin at 707-746-4297 or Steve Yee at 707-746-4240.

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