(by Karma Loveday) Environment secretary Dame Angela Eagle has selected Lisa Tennant as the Government’s preferred candidate to succeed Alan Lovell as chair of the Environment Agency. Tennant currently serves as chair of the Scottish Environment Protection Agency and chair of the NHS Pension Board for England and Wales, and is the Regional Energy Strategic Plan chair for Scotland at the National Energy System Operator. Her former roles include as a non executive director at C

(by Karma Loveday) Welsh Water has submitted the planning applications for its Cwm Taf Water Supply Strategy – the largest water infrastructure project in the company's history, that will modernise treatment facilities and supply resilience for over 400,000 properties in southern Wales. Applications have been lodged with Merthyr Tydfil County Borough Council and Bannau Brycheiniog National Park Authority for the £600m scheme which includes: Construction of a new water treatme

(by Karma Loveday) Nicola Medalova will join Yorkshire Water today as chief executive officer designate, and will succeed Nicola Shaw on 1 January. Shaw, who has led the company for the past four and a half years, will stay on for the handover period to ensure a smooth transition. Medalova has previously served as a non-executive director at Yorkshire Water, and joins from National Grid where she has worked as chief operating officer of National Grid New England and most rece

(by Karma Loveday) Scottish Water retained the top spot it held last year in British Water’s 2025 Water Company Performance Survey, which asks contractors, consultants and suppliers to rate their clients’ performance in 12 areas over the last 12 months. The 12 areas are: contract approach, attitude, professional qualities, impact on supply chain, innovation, procurement, following policy, communication, partners/main contractors, AMP transition, working digitally and sustaina

(by Karma Loveday) United Utilities – in partnership with the Environment Agency, the Lake District National Park Authority, Matt Staniek’s campaign group Save Windermere, the Love Windermere coalition, and Westmorland and Furness Council – has unveiled a uniquely ambitious plan to remove all wastewater discharges from Lake Windermere. ‘Only Rainwater into Windermere’ (ORiW) involves building 138km of new sewerage network to intercept all discharges from the ten wastewater pl

(by Karma Loveday) Northumbrian Water held on to first place position in this year’s C-MeX results on household customer experience. Its score of 80.36 for 2024/5 slipped to 75.17 in 2025/6, but it nonetheless continued to lead the pack. Portsmouth Water regained its top three position after coming fourth last year, to take second place with 75.00. Wessex fell from second place to third, with 74.54. Welsh Water left the top three, falling back to sixth. At the bottom of the t

(by Karma Loveday) Lord John Hutton would chair the Thames Water board, if the London & Valley Water Consortium acquisition and recapitalisation is allowed to proceed. Mike McTighe, who has been leading the recapitalisation proposal, would be vice-chair and would play a hands-on role in the operational transformation, including chairing a new Thames Water Turnaround Committee. The announcements followed earlier outline board appointments for a revamped Thames. Lord Hutton ser

(by Verity Mitchell) Ofwat has published Monitoring financial resilience, its report assessing the stability of the water companies in England and Wales for the year to March 2026. Although it is backwards-looking, it provides interesting comparative data. Shareholders have injected £1.8bn of equity into the companies and have pledged a further £1.7bn. There have been new investors too: Asterion and EQT have taken stakes in Southern Water and Yorkshire Water respectively. As

(by Karma Loveday) Water Resources South East (WRSE) has published a summary of the progress made in 2025/26 in delivering its regional plan (RP24) for 2025-2075. The table summarises the key developments. Good progress was made in some areas, notably on strategic schemes to increase supply, and on the smart meter rollout. Per capita consumption is lower than forecast in RP24. Other developments helping the supply-demand balance included that population and property growth

(by Karma Loveday) Almost three-quarters (74%) of Ofwat staff that are members of the PCS union and took part in a ballot on industrial action have voted to go on strike. Turnout was 89%, and an even larger majority (91%) voted in favour of action short of strike. PCS said it will now write to Ofwat and ministers to demand urgent assurances about members’ employment and working conditions. If these assurances are not provided, it will implement a programme of strike action an