How Can England Possibly Be Running Out of Water? (theguardian.com)
- Reference: 0178749734
- News link: https://news.slashdot.org/story/25/08/18/2323214/how-can-england-possibly-be-running-out-of-water
- Source link: https://www.theguardian.com/news/ng-interactive/2025/aug/17/how-can-england-possibly-be-running-out-of-water
Water companies lose approximately one trillion litres annually through leaky pipes -- 20% of all treated water -- while the annual pipe replacement rate remains at 0.05%. No new reservoir has been built in 30 years despite population growth. Government forecasts project England's public water supply could fall short by 5 billion litres daily by 2055 without urgent infrastructure investment. The economic cost of water scarcity could reach $11.48 billion over this parliament, according to thinktank Public First.
[1] https://www.theguardian.com/news/ng-interactive/2025/aug/17/how-can-england-possibly-be-running-out-of-water
Simple (Score:2, Informative)
They finally started brushing their teeth every day, and water consumption skyrocketed.
"Yeah, Baby!...Oh Behave!" (Score:1)
> They finally started brushing their teeth every day
Actually the British do tend to have crooked teeth, but it's not due to hygiene, but rather that their jaw is rapidly shrinking relative to typical evolution rates, and their teeth placement hasn't caught up yet.
The leading theory is that dental problems are a frequent cause of more general health problems, at least since the invention of "starch" (doctored flour) and plentiful sugar such that the smaller your mouth the less problems are caused by dental pr
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The British have crooked teeth because they do not have a fetish for braces like Americans.
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I think it was marked Troll because it very clearly is not only simple corruption "full stop". The article itself mentions multiple causes, but does include privatization meaning more money going to shareholders and less into infrastructure.
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And as I said, that is only one of multiple causes. It is not just because of corruption.
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Now you're just moving the goal post. You said political corruption, now you're saying human corruption. Regardless, one of the causes is population growth. While humans obvious have some say as to whether they procreate, choosing to do so is not in of itself a sign of corruption. While corruption can affect population growth, it's not the sole or even main driving factor.
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Many countries runs out of water because during the last century there have been an excessive draining of wetlands to increase the areas where crop can grow. The downside is that the ground water table suffers and sinks all the time now because the water is sent off into the sea instead of getting enough time to get into the ground.
No new reservoirs in over 30 years (Score:2)
They haven't built any new reservoirs since 1992. That's worse than New Jersey, where we're kinda backwards; instead of turning low areas into reservoirs, we take high areas, dig out all the rock, and then make reservoirs in the hole.
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In New Jersey, they usually dig holes in order to bury bodies. Not necessarily bodies of water.
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When I lived in NJ, the mob reputedly dropped bodies right into the local creek.
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The idea is that having the reservoirs high up provides water pressure to move the water (the same principle as a water tower).
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I think the idea behind water towers was that you need power to fill them, but they provide water pressure even when the power is out.
Re: No new reservoirs in over 30 years (Score:2)
It's also economic. They provide more peak flow than the pumps. If you have a gravity assist, the pumps can be sized for average flow. Cheaper to build, cheaper to run, and more reliable.
It doesn't seem so odd (Score:2)
Sure, England (UK) is surrounded by oceans, but you can't drink that water or use it for irrigation. Being an island, there's not as much land area to catch rainfall, as there is in places like the Americas and Europe. They may need to take a cue from Israel and start building desalination plants.
Re:It doesn't seem so odd (Score:5, Insightful)
England has no shortage of rainfall. They need to build reservoir capacity to match population growth and consumption trends, which they haven't been doing.
This isn't a "holy shit we need to spend $100B on desalinization" problem, this is a "we neglected to scale our infrastructure and now we're getting bottlenecked the same way people have in SimCity for 25+ years" problem.
Took me 5 seconds (Score:2, Flamebait)
To find this, [1]https://www.theguardian.com/en... [theguardian.com]
Yeah like most of the rest of the world England is experiencing drought. Not as bad as parts of America but still not good.
Climate change is breaking the water cycle. It's a global phenomenon so everybody gets hit by it.
Yes they could counteract that with a shit ton of infrastructure spending but they're ruling class isn't going to allow that. Any more than America's ruling class is going to.
Your civilization is collapsing. Good luck dying before
[1] https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/aug/12/experts-discuss-plans-save-water-dry-conditions-worsen-across-england-national-drought-group
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At first your response seemed insightful, until you started yammering on about the "ruling class." Guess what, both the US and the UK have elected representative governments. And despite the many flaws in the systems of both countries, politicians actually do listen to the people, because they want to get re-elected. WE are the ruling class.
Let me translate (Score:2)
I was agreeing with you until you reminded me of something I didn't want to think about and so now I disagree with you...
You not liking the ruling class doesn't mean the ruling class ceases to exist or that you will not have to face the consequences of allowing a ruling class to exist.
The reason the ruling class comes into this is that the infrastructure is spending that would compensate for the damage being done isn't allowed because ruling class wants to be trillionaires and you're in the way.
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I don't think you read what I said.
The ruling class exists. I like it a lot. We--you and I--are in it.
Guess what, the "ruling class" is not homogenous. It consists of people of all different kinds of persuasions, many of whom disagree with you. They have as much right to an opinion as you do. Majority rules. Sure that sucks for some people like you who are not in the majority, but "majority rules" is better by far than "dictator rules" or "our dear leader rules."
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Building traditional reservoirs and pipelines, probably wouldn't be much less than that $100B figure.
20%? (Score:2)
It is insane to lose 20% of your water from leaky pipes. We only lose about 5% of electricity in transmission and we can SEE a leaky pipes.
Sorry, but it sounds to me like the UK needs to dig up all their pipes and put them in the air so we can see the leaks and fix them.
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Some of the pipes are really old. It is reputed that there are water or sewer pipes in New York that are wood and date back to the early 1800s in not before. Lack of maintenance will catch up with you eventually and it is easy ignore buried pipes that no one sees.
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> It is reputed that there are water or sewer pipes in New York that are wood and date back to the early 1800s in not before. Lack of maintenance will catch up with you eventually
Yep, you've got to sand down those pipes and slap on a fresh coat of spar urethane at least every three years.
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This is a fascinating book about old infrastructure. [1]https://www.amazon.com/Underne... [amazon.com]
[1] https://www.amazon.com/Underneath-New-York-Harry-Granick/dp/0823213129
Re: 20%? (Score:3)
My town loses up to half its water due to leaky pipes. 41% in 2024. You can't see most of the leaks. They're underground.
Every year we have water restrictions. While the council neglects to fix the pipes. While they turn roads into cycle ways above the leaky pipes. I wouldn't be so annoyed at the loss of roads if they replaced the pipes while they were digging up the road. At least we have empty cycle lanes to admire now. Traffic turns to shit when the weather is bad.
Do as the Romans did (Score:2, Funny)
Take all your immigrants and put them to work building aqueducts.
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So, you Trumptards see immigrants as a slave labor force, now, huh? Is there a bottom for you scum bags?
Too many emails in their inboxes (Score:1)
That has to be it, that's something they are asking people to delete.
Easy to explain: Too many old emails stored (Score:3)
As explained so clearly at [1]https://www.gov.uk/government/... [www.gov.uk]
> Delete old emails and pictures as data centres require vast amounts of water to cool their systems.
So the reason for the water shortage must be those damn email hoarders. (Of course, the GCHQ will retain a copy of all your emails, too.)
[1] https://www.gov.uk/government/news/national-drought-group-meets-to-address-nationally-significant-water-shortfall
Stealing from Wales (Score:2)
England will just continue stealing water from Wales.
2055? Never believe 30 year "crisis" forecasts (Score:2)
Any forecast involving dire predictions for a time the authors will likely be retired and unaccountable should be taken with more than a grain of salt. And this is a "think tank" report. There isn't a think tank in the world that isn't funded by people looking for a political outcome. And given an increasingly authoritarian UK government, handing over "crisis" control of the water supply would be a very bad thing indeed.
They're also talking about capacity dropping just below 70%, something that has happe
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It is a crisis in terms of funding and building replacement lines. 30 years and a ~50 year economic service life means you need to be spending enough to replace at least 2% of lines per year, assuming prioritization is efficient. If it isn't efficient then it is closer to 3.5-4% per year. The situation is quite similar to bridges in the US.
Ultimately, once the water gets mixed with salt it is "lost" and being an island that is pretty easy to do.
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Water lost to the sea is generally industrial discharge that isn't being reprocessed rather than civilian usage. Leaking pipes are far more likely to contribute to ground water which remains fresh.
Reservoir capacity has dropped below these levels in the recent past and many times previously and recovered, there's no reason to believe it won't recover again. 70% capacity is not a red alert moment.
Re:2055? Never believe 30 year "crisis" forecasts (Score:4, Informative)
Of course it's not a red alert moment, the idea is that one doesn't want those though. Water infrastructure takes a long time to build so waiting until there are emergency levels of water left before addressing the problem isn't terribly practical.
Your idea of building desalinization plant above is very impractical by the way. The UK might be in a bit of a drought but it still gets many times the rain fall it needs to support the current population. It just needs to be trapped in reservoirs before it runs into the sea. Due to cost desalinization plants are almost always the last option a country should choose for water.
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Well since the reservoirs are at 67% capacity, I'd say all they need is another good rainfall to add another 33%.
Re: 2055? Never believe 30 year "crisis" forecasts (Score:2)
Underground aquifers that are extracted from too much that are close to the sea can be destroyed by sea water contamination.
Privatisation (Score:5, Interesting)
Privatise a public good, reap the rewards. She (Mrs Thatcher) sold off the family silver for short-term gain (and after she'd hamstrung the old water authorities by denying them access to loans for infrastructure). Now a bunch of water companies "compete" to make the most profit, by raising bills and reducing investment. Yay. Another bit of right-wing nonsense the country gets to enjoy.
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Exactly. If you're running a monopoly (customers cannot choose their water provider) you're never going to make major investments that hit your bottom line.
The government needs to make them accountable and if they miss key quality of service levels, they face losing their territories
Obvious things..: (Score:2, Insightful)
Mass immigration. And bugger all if any plan to increase or improve water supply in terms of quality and quantity.
Obvious answer (Score:2)
Socio Economic Collapse and Climate Collapse.
That newspapers even need to ask this question at this late stage proves beyond any doubt
that were not coming back from this, some studies suggest as low as a 5% chance of avoiding this within
the next 5-10 yrs
Easy to figure out (Score:3)
They are pumping out their ground water, fast tracking it to the sewers, which drain into rivers and ultimately the ocean. Doing likewise with storm water means ground water never gets replenished, meaning desertification. Go get an earth science book and study the water cycle. Cut down trees for development means less water vapor in the air and means less rain,
Re: Easy to figure out (Score:3)
But the water that evaporates from trees is extracted from ground water. That's how trees work. In fact they evaporate less water than they extract from the ground. It's how trees grow. That's how they get the hydrogen that they use to build the carbohydrates they're made from, by splitting H2O.
More trees can reduce ground water. The only way they can increase ground water is by slowing down rainfall, giving it more time to be absorbed.
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In certain regions, notably the California coast, trees precipitate (apology) fog drip from recurrent coastal fog, which forms a substantial fraction of the tree's water supply.
Diveristy to the rescue! (Score:1)
Because immigrants don't wash, thus saving water. Oh wait... Poms don't wash either. They're doomed.
Redesig those constantly refilling urinals (Score:2)
Redesigning those constantly refilling urinals will go a really long way to help save water.
When I visit the UK I'm astonished the urinals just constantly flush all day long, even when nobody has been in there for hours, and even overnight.
One trillion litres annually (Score:2)
One trillion litres ? That's like 1,800 Libraries of Congress!
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Thanks to budget cuts, the Library of Congress does leak.