Chapter
Benchmarking in the Water Industry. Basic Principles, Applicability and Methodology.
Book
Pumps, Electromechanical Devices and Systems Applied to Urban Water Management
Pages in which appears this chapter
37-45
ISBN
90-5809-574-6
Publish year
2003
Abstract
After the great interest arisen in the last decade around performance indicators for water utilities, the focus in the past few years has been placed on benchmarking. However and despite the strong trend to integrate benchmarking techniques worldwide in the water industry, misconceptions are often found even in the literature. Nowadays it is commonly understood that there are two types of benchmarking: metric and process benchmarking. However, both types are quite different despite their common name. This paper presents the basic principles behind benchmarking, highlighting the differences between both types, when they may be applicable and useful and a brief description of the methodology to be applied.