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The taskforce for water resilience has come up with 10 recommendations for Ofwat to improve co-ordination of plans that are in place to ensure resilience in the water sector.
The group, chaired by Waterwise managing director Jacob Tompkins, said that although there has been “a lot of work on resilience in the sector” to make sure plans are “in place”, better co-ordination is needed both within the sector and with other sectors and the wider public.
The taskforce has produced a set of 10 recommendations, presented to Ofwat and other sector stakeholders on 1 December, to help meet challenges such as trends in demographics and the impact of climate change.
Among the recommendations is that the industry should agree a shared definition of resilience for the sector. The group finalised the wording of its definition of resilience as: “Resilience is the ability to cope with, and recover from, disruption, and anticipate trends and variability in order to maintain services for people and protect the natural environment now and in the future.”
Increasing public engagement and education, creating “clear routes” for funding, coherent planning for resilience at a national and regional level, and establishing wastewater, sewerage and drainage plans are also recommended. Additionally, the task and finish group suggested the industry establish a water and wastewater resilience action group.
The taskforce was created as an arms-length body by Ofwat in response to a new statutory duty for resilience in the Water Act given it by the government last year.
The regulator will publish its initial response to the report in December, along with its approach to resilience and a consultation on Water 2020, Ofwat’s regulatory framework for PR19. The recommendations will help inform the development of Water 2020.
The full list of recommendations is as follows:
– Agree a shared definition of resilience for the sector.
– Increase public engagement and education.
– Ensure clear routes for funding legitimate resilience measures.
– Ensure coherent planning for resilience at both a national and regional level.
– Establish wastewater, sewerage and drainage plans.
– Improve understanding of risk and failure.
– Ensure services are resilient under different water sector structures.
– Develop benchmarking, standards and metrics.
– Ensure existing plans are stress-tested.
– Establish a water and wastewater resilience action group.
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