Rent payment for water in 2026: which volumes of water use are taxable
Rent payers for special water use are the so-called primary water users. These are enterprises, institutions, organizations, and individual entrepreneurs who independently withdraw water from water bodies or receive it through their own water intake facilities, and may also transfer this water to other consumers.
Primary water users include business entities that have their own water intake facilities and equipment for water withdrawal, as well as those who receive water from irrigation or drainage system canals, reservoirs, ponds, water management systems, and water pipelines.
Special water use involves withdrawing water from water bodies using structures or technical devices, its use, and the discharge of pollutants into water bodies.
The amount of rent payment is determined based on the actual volume of water used—either underground or surface water. The calculation takes into account the volumes specified in the special water use permit or integrated environmental permit, established limits, rent payment rates, and relevant coefficients.
The object of taxation is the actual volume of water used by the water user, notes the Tax Service.
At the same time, the Tax Code provides cases when rent payment is not charged. In particular, it is not required to pay for water used to meet the drinking and sanitary-hygienic needs of the population. Water used exclusively for the own drinking and sanitary-hygienic needs of enterprises, individual entrepreneurs, and single tax payers is also exempt from taxation.
Certain benefits are established for housing and communal enterprises. They have the right to apply a reducing coefficient of 0.3 to the rent payment rates for volumes of water used within the approved technological standards for drinking water use.
Depending on the direction of water use or supply, tax authorities effectively divide the object of taxation into three categories:
The first category is water supplied to the population to meet their drinking and sanitary-hygienic needs.
The second category is water supplied to legal entities and individual entrepreneurs, including heat supply organizations, condominiums, housing construction cooperatives, and other consumers. It does not matter for what purposes these consumers use the received water.
The third category is water that housing and communal enterprises use for their own technological needs within the standards established by legislation on drinking water, water supply, and wastewater disposal.
For declaring rent payment, a tax declaration approved by the Ministry of Finance is used. An integral part of the declaration is attachments, and the calculation of rent payment for special water use is carried out in attachment 5.
If a water user has several directions of water use, they must fill out a separate attachment 5 for each of them.
Thus, for volumes of water supplied to the population for drinking and sanitary-hygienic needs, the actual volume of supplied water is indicated in the attachment, but no tax liability arises, so a zero value is applied.
For volumes of water supplied to legal entities and individual entrepreneurs, the tax liability is calculated at the general rent payment rates without applying preferential coefficients.
For volumes of water that housing and communal enterprises use for their own technological needs within established standards, a reducing coefficient of 0.3 is applied.
Therefore, a primary water user who has a special water use permit or an integrated environmental permit remains a rent payer even if part of the water is used for the drinking and sanitary-hygienic needs of the population or for their own needs. However, they must pay rent only for the volumes of water used for business activities, i.e., for production or other economic needs.
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