1. Managing future water resources
Energy Alton Public Meeting
Good afternoon
20 September 2017

2. Agenda About South East Water Planning for the future
Our plan for period
Preparing our next plan – 2020 to 2080
Saving water

3. About South East Water

4. About South East Water
Supplies drinking water to 2.2 million consumers
Formed from a number of companies across the south east of England which have merged over time
Over 890,000 connections (accounts) across parts of Kent, Sussex, Surrey, Hampshire and Berkshire
Second largest water-only company in the UK. Largest is Affinity Water
Average use of water is currently 150 litres per person per day
Supplies on average 520 million litres each day, or 114 million gallons, or 525,000 tonnes peak demand during summer of approximately 650 million litres
14,500 km of water pipes (9,000 miles) covering 5,657 square km (3,514 square miles)
93 Treatment Works, 150 boreholes, 339 pumping stations, 197 service reservoirs and four surface reservoirs
We look after 32 Sites of Special Scientific Interest (SSSIs)

5. About South East Water
Relationship of our supply area to Local Authority Districts

6. About South East Water
Our supply area

7. Our regulators
The water industry is closely monitored and regulated in a number of areas:
Ofwat – agrees the prices that we can charge customers. Ofwat approves our Business Plan every five years and our charges every year
Department of Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) – deals with all aspects of water industry policy and we operate under a licence granted by the Secretary of State. Defra approves our 25-year Water Resources Management Plan every five years
Consumer Council for Water – independent of the water industry and represents the interests of customers
Drinking Water Inspectorate – ensures the legal standards for drinking water quality are met
Environment Agency – regulates how much water we can abstract from the environment, and our activities to protect and improve the quality of rivers

8. Planning for the future

9. Statutory WRMP
Statutory plan that all water companies are required to prepare every five years
Sets out how balance between available water supply and demand can be met over a 25 year period ( )
Plan has to follow guidance set out by Environment Agency, Ofwat and Defra
Water companies required to pre-consult, publish and consult upon a draft version of the plan
Representations are then made on the draft plan to Defra during statutory consultation period
Water companies publish response to explain how representations have been taken account of
Secretary of State signs off the plan, directs changes to the plan or calls the plan to a public inquiry

10. Long term Planning

11. Water Resources in the South East (WRSE) group
Formed in 1997, with role of undertaking regional scale water resources management modelling, and promote sharing of water resources
Membership comprises the six region water companies, Environment Agency, Ofwat, Natural England, DWI, CC Water and Defra
Regional modelling is run alongside process followed by water companies preparing their individual WRMPs
Defra and our regulators expect the regional modelling work to be used to ‘inform’ the development of water companies’ individual WRMPs

12. Our plan for 2015 to 2040

13. Water Resources Management Plan 2015-2040
Water companies are required to produce a Water Resources Management Plan (WRMP) every five years to set out how they will meet customers’ demand for water for the next 25 years.
Our WRMP for was published in June 2014 with approval from Defra. Our plan:
Sets out how we plan to maintain the balance between available supplies and predicted future demands
Highlights the challenges of supplying water to the south east of England
Received a high level of engagement throughout the whole process, including input and steer from Environment Focus Group

14. Water Resources Management Plan 2015-2040

15. Water Resources Management Plan 2015-2040
WRZ4 & 5: The challenges
With no action, we estimate there will be a deficit of water of approximately 41.4 million litres of water per day by 2040.
Considerable increases in population and housing in the south east will impact our demand forecast
Unpredictable weather, climate change and our reliance on groundwater supplies, rather than surface water i.e. reservoirs, will impact the water available to our customers

16. Water Resources Management Plan 2015-2040
WRZ4 & 5: The solution
Household metering programme
Demand management
Further leakage reductions
Keleher Works upgrade
Sharing of water with Portsmouth Water and Thames Water

17. Water Resources Management Plan 2015-2040
Reducing demand
Metering and our water efficiency campaign forecast to help to reduce consumption by between 10-15%
Actual savings for closer to 18%
Forecast reductions in total leaks from 93.1 Ml/d (16.2%) in 2015 to 85.7 Ml/d (14.3%) by 2040
Actual reported leakage for was Ml/d
Ml/d – million litres of water per day

18. Our next plan to 2080

19. Preparing for our next plan WRMP19 to cover period 2020 to 2080
Nov Draft Guideline consultation
Spring Publish Final Guideline
Spring 2017 Pre-consultation of WRMPs
March Draft WRMPs submitted to Secretary of State (Defra)
Summer 2018 Public consultation
Autumn 2018 Statement of Response published
Spring 2019 Final WRMP published
2015
2016
2017
2018
2019

20. Key changes
Looking at a longer planning period of 60 years (2020 to 2080)
Considering more extreme but ‘plausible’ drought events than seen in the historical record
Exploring a much wider range of possible future scenarios, to help us better understand risk and resilience
Less water available
Increase in population and property numbers - but offset to a good extent by lower levels of consumption being observed compared to previous forecast
Promote increased levels of sharing water resources by water companies
Further demand management, including leakage reductions
Looking over a longer planning horizon, and taking account wider range of different futures - the strategy locally involves increased sharing of resources with neighbouring water companies and further demand management

21. Saving water

22. Household use per capita consumption

23. Visit our website to find out more: www. southeastwater. co
Visit our website to find out more:
Something else we are exploring at the moment social norming
Free gadgets available go to or phone * and we will pop the item in the post to you. 

24. Thank you
Questions?