UK ministers in talks to raise water bills for industry

The UK Environment Agency (EA) says that talks are under way with ministers to raise water bills for businesses and industrial users to tackle supply shortages.

With the UK having the hottest summer on record this year, around 26 million people in Britain have been subject to water restrictions. This has been namely through the hosepipe ban due to drought limiting access to safe drinking water.

The EA has warned that climate change, population growth and environmental pressures have significantly impacted water supplies. It has also predicted that if “urgent action” is not taken by the government and water companies, public water supply in the UK could be short by 5bn l/d by 2055.

To tackle the shortage, the EA expects that 60% of the issue will be addressed by water companies managing demand and reducing leaks. The remaining 40% it expects will be supported through building new water infrastructure and water transfer schemes.

The government has already committed £104bn over the next five years in private water sector spending to tackling the shortage.

Helen Wakeham, director of water at the EA, has suggested that increasing the value of water for industry may also alleviate this issue.

She said: “If someone wants an abstraction licence from the EA, what they pay for is the cost of producing the licence. They don’t pay anything towards the value of that water.

“It’s the beginning of a conversation, but ministers have asked us to look at the value of water and how our abstraction licensing system works.”

The Guardian found recently that businesses, including oil refineries, chemical plants and paper mills, face “no requirements” to cut their water consumption. It found that businesses in England alone use 2.6bn l/d of water.

Compounded by current business demands is the growing data centre sector in the UK, with its capacity expected to double to 6.3 GW by 2030.

Data centres use a “substantial” amount of water for a number of operations, with the International Energy Agency finding that data centres consume more than 560bn l/a. Cooling operations, the main use of water for data centres, lose water to evaporation, meaning a consistent amount of water is needed for replenishment.

The UK government has laid out several recommendations to handle the water demands from data centres, namely for data centre operators to submit regular and mandatory water monitoring reports to assess water stress. It also recommended implementing water efficiency standards and financial incentives to operators to limit water use.