Portsmouth signs deal to supply Southern a further 15Ml a day to meet peak shortfall

Portsmouth Water and Southern Water have signed a long-term agreement to transfer 15 million litres a day from Portsmouth’s River Itchen Treatment Works to supply some 100,000 Southern customers in Southampton during the summer peak demand period.

The transfer volume under the agreement is within the terms of Portsmouth’s existing abstraction license and adds to a 2004 arrangement whereby it provides bulk supply to Southern’s Sussex area.

Portsmouth chief executive officer, Bob Taylor, said, “We are very pleased to be able to expand our emerging role of being a water supplier to the wider South East region.” Taylor's Southern Water counterpart, Ian McAulay, said the agreement will “help address the shortfall we’ll experience as a result of being able to abstract less water from the rivers Test and Itchen.”