Drought situation deteriorates

The East and West Midlands have joined Yorkshire and the North West in drought. Meanwhile prolonged dry weather status is affecting other areas of England including Lincolnshire and Northamptonshire, East Anglia and the Thames area.

Across England, rainfall was 20% less than the long-term average for June. June was also the hottest on record for England, with two heatwaves driving unusually high demand for water. Reservoir levels continue to fall, with overall storage across England at 75.6%.

In Scotland, SEPA’s latest report said scarcity had intensified across eastern Scotland, with eight river catchments at ‘moderate scarcity’ status, with five of these approaching the more serious ‘significant scarcity’ threshold at which abstractions may be limited or temporarily suspended. SEPA said it had been in regular contact with licence holders including NFUS, the Scotch Whisky Association and Scottish Golf and would communicate more with them as necessary.

Back in England, South East Water’s hosepipe ban for Kent and Sussex came into force on Friday. Last week, Thames announced a ban for Swindon, Gloucestershire, Oxfordshire, Berkshire and Wiltshire from tomorrow. And Southern announced a ban for Hampshire and the Isle of Wight effective from today, after reporting the Test and Itchen chalk streams are at critically low levels, down 24% on normal flows for this time of year.

Yorkshire Water, whose ban was in force first, has announced positive response from customers. It said water usage dropped by 80-100 million litres compared to the previous heatwaves in June – the equivalent to Hull’s daily supply. Usage hit 1.39bn litres on 12 July and 1.37bn litres on 13 July as temperatures soared in the region, compared to 1.47bn litres during the heatwaves of 20 June and 30 June.