Regional plans published ahead of revised National Framework

Water Resources South East (WRSE) and Water Resources West (WRW) published their final regional plans last week, ahead of the Environment Agency’s publication tomorrow of the second National Framework for Water Resources. The revised Framework will provide an up-to-date assessment of the country’s future water needs and confirm requirements for the next set of regional plans.

The latest publications marked a major milestone in regional water resource planning, with WRSE and WRW joining Water Resources East – which has already published its final plan – in setting out a long-term strategy for supply and demand that will leave more water in the environment.

WRSE’s plan is very advanced and provides what chair Chris Murray described as a “blueprint for water supply investment by each of the six water companies in the region” as they cope with reenergised economic growth on top of existing pressures from environmental destinations, climate change, drought resilience and population growth. The £19.3bn WRSE plan showed a shortfall of 2.7bn litres a day by 2075, which will be met by leakage and usage reductions teamed with supply side schemes including five new and one enlarged reservoir, the Grand Union Canal transfer, eight water recycling plants and six desalination plants.

Water Resources West’s plan identified a need for 1.1bn litres a day extra for public water supply needs by 2050, plus 100m litres a day extra for non-public water supply needs. Along with demand reduction measures, the plan included new abstractions, in and inter-regions transfers and reservoir expansions.