We all use water every day for everything from flushing the loo to making a cup of tea. When everyone turns on their taps, has a shower or uses the dishwasher at the same time, it can put pressure on our water supply network.
That’s why we’re asking you to make a few simple changes at home to save water. This means there’s more water for everyone, and more water stays in the environment.
Saving water at home is easier than you think. Here are a few ideas:
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Updates about your water supply
The amount of water people use each day changes depending on the weather. We normally supply around 544 million litres of water a day. In the summer months, this can go up to over 600 million litres a day.
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Water in your area
Thank you for saving water during the warm weather last summer. This meant our reservoirs recovered quickly in autumn and early winter.
As we move into summer, all areas are currently at green alert level. This means you can use water as normal. However, we’d really appreciate it if you could continue to be mindful of how much water you use. This helps keep the taps flowing for everyone.
We’re doing everything we can to treat and supply water as quickly as possible. But treated water is fresh, so we can only store it for a limited time. There’s also a limit to how much water we can treat each day. Our sites work 24/7, but if people use more water than we can produce, some customers may temporarily lose supply in some areas.
This is why we encourage you to reuse water where you can. It really makes a difference.
What we're doing to improve our network
We’re always making improvements to our network to make sure we can supply water to everyone. To prepare for summer, we have:
- Increased the amount of water we can treat at several sites across Kent and Sussex.
- Changed when we do maintenance on our water treatment works and treated water storage tanks to make sure we have as much water available as possible.
- Increased the amount of untreated (raw) water we can take from locations in Kent.
- Repaired over 20,000 leaks in 2023/24.
- Appointed a dedicated Alternative Water Manager and bought two water tankers. These tankers help us move water around the network and boost supplies if needed.
- Identified ‘at risk’ areas for closer monitoring and developed plans to put in place if there are any water shortages.
There’s still more to do. The south east of England is one of the most water-stressed areas in the country. We need new treatment plants, storage reservoirs and pipes to make sure we always have enough water in the future. It takes time to plan and build these.
Projects we're working on to improve our water supply:
- We’re installing about 17 kilometres of new pipes between our water treatment works at Bewl and our drinking water storage tanks at Wadhurst and Rotherfield. This will improve the water supply in the Wadhurst and Best Beech areas. This work started in April 2024 and is due to finish in 2025. We’re also upgrading our Bewl Water Treatment Works to increase the amount of water we can treat and supply to the area. You can find out more here.
- We’re installing 16 kilometres of new water pipes in two areas of Kent. One is from our Wichling Water Treatment Works through Doddington, and the other connects two drinking water storage tanks on either side of Charing. Work began in April 2023, and the first phase (Wichling/Doddington) is almost complete. You can find out more here.
- We’re building a new, state-of-the-art water treatment works at Aylesford near Maidstone. The site will have new features, such as two water storage tanks, so we can keep supplying water while we carry out essential maintenance. You can watch the progress of the site build and find out more here.
We also have lots of plans to improve our network in the future. These are set out in our business plan, which we’ve sent to our regulator, Ofwat. You can read the plan here.
Reservoirs
During the summer, we use water from our reservoirs to supply the extra water everyone needs.
Our biggest reservoirs in Sussex, Ardingly and Arlington, store up to 8,300 million litres of water and supply 8% of all the water we provide.
We also get water from boreholes and chalk aquifers.
Our reservoirs refill between October and April when there’s more rain. You can find out more about our reservoirs here.
Treatment and beyond
Once we collect water from the source, we treat it to make sure it’s safe to drink.We take great care over the quality of our water and constantly monitor our treatment process.
Once the water is treated, we send it to drinking water storage tanks around our region. These tanks connect to the pipes that deliver water to your tap.
This process can take several hours, and high water usage makes it harder for us to supply water to everyone. You can find out more about our processes here.
