How much does 1 m3 of water cost?

The private pool in the garden is a dream of many. But every pool owner has surely wondered before: “How much does 1 m3 of water cost?“. Because a medium-sized pool holds 18-25 m3 of water and the water of the pool also wants to be changed sometimes. We have researched what costs 1 m3 in Berlin, Munich, Frankfurt, Hamburg and other cities. We show the most expensive water cities and the cheapest water cities in Germany.

What does 1 m3 of water cost in…

The cities issue fee regulations and determine in them what 1 m3 of water costs in the respective city. We have looked into the fee regulations of the cities and compared the sometimes far different prices in our comparison table.

What is the price for 1 m3 of water?

The cities and municipalities charge a price per 1 m3 of water, which is made up of several individual prices.

• The price per 1 m3 of drinking water
  This is the water that we get as “tap water” from the city’s waterworks.
• The price per 1 m3 of dirty water
  We pay this price to the municipality for every 1 m3 of water we have obtained as drinking water. This fee is charged by the city for the treatment of the former drinking water discharged again as wastewater.

If you want to take it exactly, then you have to add another price to the annual price. This is the fee for the water meter. This fee is calculated according to the size ( more precisely: according to the flow rate ) of the water meter. At the end of the year, you have to transfer the counter’s fee to the received m3 of drinking water.

Example: How to calculate the price for 1 m3 of water

Let’s take a family of 4. If this family has a consumption of 40 m3 of water per year, then a sample municipality would charge the following fees for this. We have taken the prices as an example from the table above.

• For the related Potable will be 40 m3 x 2.00 euro/m3 = 80 Euros calculate.
• For the Sewage will be 40 m3 x 3.50 euro/m3 = 140 Euro calculate.
• For the Water meter the city calculates once a year 50 Euros.

This results in total costs for water in the amount of 80 + 140 + 50 = 270 Euros. If you transfer the 270 euros to the purchased 40 m3 of water, then 1 m3 of water costs 6.75 euros. (= 270 Euro / 40 m3)

How much does 1 m3 of drinking water cost in Germany? The labor price

For the drinking water we Germans pay the so-called labor price. It is around 0.2 cents per liter. We have already seen some examples of the liter price of drinking water in the table above. If you compare the price of a liter of drinking water with the price of a liter of mineral water, you are amazed. Mineral water costs 7 to 25 times more than drinking water.

For one euro you get about 500 liters of water from the tap – compared to only 2-6 bottles of mineral water in the supermarket. Untersuchungen have shown that our tap water is in no way inferior in quality to mineral water.

If we look abroad across the German borders, we will notice that the prices per 1 m3 of water vary greatly from country to country. Unfortunately, Germany is at the top of the inglorious list of the most expensive water countries in the world at number 3.

How much does 1 m3 of wastewater cost? The price of dirty water

For every 1 m3 of drinking water provided, the city charges a fee for its discharge into the municipal wastewater network. The city also charges a fee for water that comes down as precipitation on the property on which our apartment is located, because even this water must be discharged by the city in the sewage network and, if necessary, treated. However, we will provide additional information on this below.

Depending on the city, the “price” for 1 m3 of dirty water can vary greatly. From the table above it is easy to see that living in Mainz is very cheap, because the city charges only 1.40 euros per m3 for the discharge into the sewage network. The situation is quite different in Wuppertal. There the city charges more than twice for exactly the same performance. So if you are thinking about moving within Germany, you should also consider the local fees and charges of the municipality for water and other services when choosing a place of residence.

In our example above for the calculation of the price for 1 m3 of water, you can see how the fee for the wastewater is included.

What is the price per square meter for rainwater?

The rainwater – as the rainwater is called in the official German – must also be discharged into the sewage network of the municipality. However, a lower fee is charged by the municipality, based on the fact that this water requires less treatment.

The fee for rainwater is also not charged per m3. After all, it would also be difficult to determine how many m3 of rainwater and how many m3 of drinking water were discharged into the wastewater. Here the municipality brings the land area into the calculation and charges an amount per m2 of land area. In addition, a distinction is made between the fastened surface and the so-called water-impermeable surface (the sealed surface). For commercial properties such as supermarkets, for example, parking spaces are among the sealed areas.

The calculation for private households differs from the calculation for commercial real estate. For private households, the built-up area of the plot, the size of the roof and the waterproof coverings are taken into account. Depending on the city, the fee for rainwater – the precipitation water fee – ranges from 0.65 euros to 2.00 euros per m2 of area. If you live in a medium-sized detached house, you will have to expect an average precipitation fee of 140 to 210 euros per year in Germany.

How much does 1 m3 of water cost in France?

The answer is as short as it is concise: “Less!“. Germany holds the bronze medal in the top 10 list of the most expensive water countries on Earth. China and India are at the bottom of the list. On average, the water costs only one tenth compared to Germany.