The Federal Region recorded a water waste of 402,287 thousand water boxes per day in 2023. Water Loss Study 2025 It was implemented by the Instituto Trata Brasil (ITB). The lost water would have served more than 700,000 people in the defense area, and by comparison, 121 Olympic-sized swimming pools were wasted every day.
The study was prepared based on public data from the National Basic Sanitation Information System (SINISA) and includes an analysis of Brazil, its five major regions, the 27 federation units and also the 100 most populous municipalities that appeared in the 2025 Sanitation Ranking.
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In the ranking made among all states, the Federal District is the third federal unit that wastes the least water, with 31.46% in loss of distribution, behind Goiás (25.68%) and Tocantins (30.96%). There was a decrease of two percentage points compared to the survey issued by the Trata Brasil Institute in 2024.
In Brazil, the acceptable level of water losses is defined by Order No. 490/2021 of the Ministry of Regional Development (MDR), which states that for a municipality to have excellent levels of water losses, it must have a maximum of 25% in distribution losses and 216 liters per delivery per day by 2034.
The research shows that losses can occur in the water supply process for various reasons, such as leaks, measurement errors and unauthorized consumption. “This waste has negative impacts on the environment, revenues and production costs of companies, making the system as a whole more expensive, which ultimately harms all users,” the institute explains.
Brazil wastes 6 thousand liters
The total volume of non-revenue water in 2023 is approximately 5.8 billion cubic meters, equivalent to the daily waste of 6,346 Olympic swimming pools of treated water or the contents of 21,153,224 household water tanks, each of which is capable of serving a family of 5 people for one day;
“In the year of the water crisis, taking into account losses due to leakages only, a lost volume of more than 3 billion cubic meters would be enough to supply about 50 million Brazilians in one year. This volume could supply the entire population of Spain,” the research says.
Even with the same volume, it would be possible to supply the 17.2 million Brazilians living in vulnerable communities for about two years.