Ambitious water efficiency targets needed to meet climate change commitments

Water efficiency must be included in current government planning if net-zero targets are to be met, the co-author of a new report launched by the Westminster Sustainable Business Forum has told Utility Week.

The group, administered by the cross-party thinktank Policy Connect, has proposed ambitious targets to reduce per capita consumption (PCC) its current average of 143 litres per person per day to less than 90 litres by 2050 at little-to-no cost to billpayers.

The target is one of a series of recommendations for the sector, stakeholders and government to address the consequences of climate change, population growth and reaching carbon net zero.

In its report out today, titled ‘Bricks and Water’, the coalition of business leaders, parliamentarians and civil servants, outlined a vision for homes of the future in which new and existing dwellings use water efficiently, manage surface water runoff sustainably and are resilient to flooding.

“There is an appetite to deliver high quality and sustainable homes from the government and we are hopeful to see these recommendations incorporated,” report co-author Robert Allen, sustainability policy manager at Policy Connect, told Utility Week. “They will have to be if we are going to meet out net-zero target and to ensure homes are fit for the future and habitable to the end of the century.”

He said timing is key to ensure conversations about water are included in current consultations and whitepapers on housebuilding and national planning policy.

As well as setting a national consumption target for water use, the report recommended introducing a mandatory water label; ensuring wider uptake of property flood resilience measures; making sustainable drainage systems (SuDS) mandatory for new developments; and measuring and improving the water performance of new and existing homes in a way similar to buildings energy ratings.

It said the water performance of homes should be assessed whenever they are built, rented or sold so the buyer or tenant is aware of the efficiency of the property before they make a decision.

Allen said: “Very few people know how much they are using so this would give homeowners a better idea of how to save water energy, water and money.”

He said the body behind the EPC believes homes could be assessed and their water performance included in the ratings at minimal extra cost.

The report sets a timetable for achieving the desired outcomes by 2050 that includes the introduction of a mandatory water label this year. The inclusion of such a measure in the upcoming Environment Bill was mentioned but not explicitly set out in a draft.

From 2020, the report also advised accelerating installation and retrofit smart meter programmes and introducing water efficiency performance in a voluntary capacity to EPC energy ratings.

Other goals for this year, include Defra setting a national consumption target for water, something that has been anticipated in its long-awaited report on water usage.

Allen said: “We are calling for a reduction in personal consumption, initially to below 100 litres per person per day and ideally if we pull together all the recommendations in the report, we could get down to the mid-80s by 2050. It’s ambitious but demonstrated by evidence that if measures such as metering, water labelling, grey water recycling, water recycling are layered up together then it is achievable to get down to those levels of consumption.”

Widespread adoption of SuDS by water companies, the report said, should also begin this year and the regulator should work to reduce the number of pollution incidents associated with combined sewer overflows with an incentives related to wastewater treatment systems.

The report builds on a previous Bricks and Water inquiry by Policy Connect that focused on water planning, policy, and building recommendations at a catchment scale. The latest paper looks at what homeowners can do as well as water companies and businesses to adapt to climate change.