South East Water provides water, sewerage and recycled water services to residential, commercial and industrial customers totalling more than 1.7 million people in Melbourne’s south east. Their service region covers 3,640 square kilometres from Port Melbourne to Portsea and some 30 kilometres east of Pakenham. The utility manages a water and sewer network made up of more than 24,000 kilometres of pipeline, 81 water pump stations, 259 sewage pump stations, nine recycled water pump stations, eight water recycling plants, and one stormwater treatment plant. It is a state-owned corporation responsible to the Department of Environment, Land, Water and Planning. It is regulated by the Department of Health and Human Services for drinking water quality, the Environment Protection Authority for recycled water quality, and the Essential Services Commission is the water industry’s economic regulator. On April 24, 2017 at the Global Water Summit 2017 in Madrid, Lucia Cade, Chair of South East Water, accepted the offer for membership into the Leading Utilities of the World network and received a 'Golden Tap' award for utility performance, representing the achievement of the highest level of utility service.