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News and updates from Envireau Water.
20th February - a day of drought discussions
DEFRA held a drought summit yesterday in London chaired by Environment Secretary Caroline Spelman. Invited were water companies, farmers and wildlife groups to discuss the situation in south-east England, East Anglia and the East Midlands.
It was reported to Envireau Water immediately after the meeting that the overall tone of the meeting was positive and constructive with the farming sector, water companies and the Agency all working together well to minimise impacts.
Water Companies are most worried about the potential of a knock on of severe shortages going into the 2013 season and are adopting a ‘ no regret’s’ policy – this means they are applying for restrictions, drought orders and permits now to minimise and avoid if possible, the risk of draconian measures for the summer of 2013. Public water supply has a statutory duty to supply and therefore has priority over other abstractors such as agriculture for the supply that is available. This is a major concern to the farming community who currently have no 'emergency powers' available to them.
Farmers are already making significant business risk (financial loss) decisions to reduce planting for this year as an adaptive measure to water resources stress. The UKIA argued that food security is as important as energy or water security, and should be allocated on an equal basis.
The Agency said they were developing a flexible approach that would enable abstractors to take water throughout the year when flow conditions were acceptable. This is good news for surface water abstractors but further consideration needs to be given as to how this may translate to groundwater abstractors.
Finally there was a discussion about setting up a 'National Drought Management Team' that would bring together all the interested parties to collaborate on water issues in a regular structured manner rather than relying on drought summits to air views and make recommendations. This seems to be a very sensible step as there is no forum at present at which all parties are represented in discussions.
A further more focussed ministerial meeting is to be held in April, to further discuss the issues raised as we enter the summer season.
While the Drought Summit was taking place in London, Envireau Water was talking local scale drought strategy at a meeting with the Environment Agency in Brampton, Huntingdon. Section 57 restrictions on groundwater, as well as surface water abstractions this summer, are a real possibility from June onwards and Envireau Water wanted to be clear on how the Agency is assessing the severity of the situation, how decisions are being made internally and how usage of Section 57 on groundwater licences might actually affect the drought situation in reality.
Earlier in the day early risers would have heard Keith Weatherhead of Cranfield University voicing the farming communities concerns about the drought on Radio 4’s Farming Today program. Keith made some very valuable points about the scale of agricultural water usage (1% of total) compared to other sector water users in the UK as well as the potential for irrigation scarcity to force up the price of UK grown fruit and vegetables, or worst case causing buyers to look abroad for sources of produce.
All in all it was a very drought focussed day across the country!