EA: abstraction rules could be slackened

The Environment Agency has implicitly acknowledged that river ecosystems could lose out to water abstractors as resources get increasingly scarce.

The agency’s 2050 water availability models include scenarios where environmental protection flow thresholds are allowed to fall in proportion to flow reductions caused by climate change.
This would reduce the risk of catchments not being able to meet the demands of abstraction.
Trevor Bishop, head of water resources at the agency, said: “If you want to maintain environmental flows as they are today, then obviously there will be less for people and the economy.”
Rose Timlett, freshwater programme manager at WWF-UK, cautioned against assuming the environment could take the impact of reduced flows. “Making sure we have enough water for the environment is one way we can make our ecosystems more resilient to climate change,” she said.
The Environment Agency models, published in its Case for Change report, also showed the effects of sustainable behaviour compared with unconstrained demand.
Colin Fenn, consultant and chair of CIWEM’s water resources panel, said the models showed environmental management was “far more significant” to water security than demand management.
However, he went on to stress the importance of demand management, “because we need to use all the tools at our disposal” to battle water scarcity.
He said the industry was “still more confident in sinking a borehole” than attempting to make ten thousand people use 10 per cent less water.

by Megan Darby

This article first appeared in Utility Week’s print edition of 20 January 2012.
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