Castle Water seeks wholesale authorisation to explore alternative supplies for larger customers

Ofwat is consulting until 12 August on amending Castle Water’s retail licence to add a wholesale authorisation, to enable it to introduce water into the public water networks of English water undertakers. This is with a view to supply its own non-household customers who consume at least 5 megalitres of water a year.

Castle has made the application in order to progress The Didcot Project, a scheme funded through Ofwat’s Innovation Fund, which seeks to understand the feasibility of taking water abstracted by a third party from the River Thames, under an existing permit, treating it to drinking water standard and putting it into Thames Water’s network. The project will assess whether smaller package schemes serving local customers would benefit the market.

Castle needs a wholesale authorisation on its licence to then progress a Combined Supply application with Thames.

The DWI would need to approve any new water source that Castle introduced and to regulate the quality of the supply.