Water securityWill London run out of water?
The U.K.’s Environment Agency warns in a new report that England could suffer major water shortages by 2030 and that London is particularly at risk. The BBC agrees, placing London on its recent list of 11 cities most likely to run out of drinking water along with the likes of Cape Town, where an ongoing water crisis has caused social and economic disruption. There are limits to what can be achieved just by fixing leaky pipes or getting people to water their lawns less often. Though such measures are useful, they will not safeguard London’s water supplies against the more extreme combinations of growth and climate change.
Earlier this year, an unusual weather pattern dubbed the Beast from the East covered much of Britain in heavy snow. But once the beast had passed, things soon returned to normal and, at the beginning of March, the temperature in London jumped by more than 10℃ in just two days. Water pipes that had been frozen solid quickly thawed, and the sudden flood soon overwhelmed the capital’s creaky infrastructure, causing many pipes to burst. More than 20,000 homes in the city were left without water, and residents had to queue for handouts.
Could this become a common sight in future? The U.K.’s Environment Agency certainly thinks so, as it warns in a new report that England could suffer major water shortages by 2030 and that London is particularly at risk. The BBC agrees, placing London on its recent list of 11 cities most likely to run out of drinking water along with the likes of Cape Town, where an ongoing water crisis has caused social and economic disruption.
London is unlikely to experience such shortages this summer. It is the winter (not the summer) weather that determines whether or not the city runs out of water, and winter 2017-18 had plenty of rain. But what happens after a dry winter?
At Oxford’s Environmental Change Institute, colleagues and I have addressed the question of how to prevent London from becoming the next Cape Town. Our research shows that if no action is taken the city is indeed set to experience more frequent and severe water shortages in the future. This is mainly down to population growth, but climate change complicates things further as it will mean more frequent and intense droughts.
In agreement with the plans developed by Thames Water – the private utility responsible for providing water and sewage services for most Londoners – our research shows that aggressive demand management to reduce consumption and losses in the distribution system (called leakage) is a priority to be implemented immediately. But reducing leaks from London’s old water pipes is not an easy task.
