WRE reports much positive progress but extra challenges from new growth ambitions.
There were many positive messages conveyed in Water Resources East (WRE)’s first-ever annual progress report on its December 2023 Regional Water Resources Plan for Eastern England, and much to admire in the cross-sector collaboration achieved— notably that water resources planning for agriculture is now underway in earnest. However, it also became clear in 2024, with the election of a new Government focused on growth, that much more action will be needed to accommodate that ministerial ambition and sustainably balance supply and demand in Eastern England in the decades ahead.
Business Growth Constraints
In his foreword to the report, WRE chair Dr. Paul Leinster CBE pointed out that the most important driver of investment in the regional plan is to leave more water in the environment for nature. WRE has committed to the most ambitious ‘Enhance’ environmental destination; pressure on the water environment from a lack of water body flows is intense in some areas. However, the current water availability situation is already constraining business growth.
Connections for non-domestic water use are now routinely limited to 20,000 litres per day. While companies have a duty to supply water for domestic business use, such as cooking and sanitation, other uses can be rationed. The report explained: “This [20,000 litres] is insufficient for water-intensive businesses such as meat processing, food and drink manufacturing, green hydrogen, data centres, and gigafactories.”
There are some exemptions for Cambridge, given the Government’s specific growth targets there. Some developments are being allowed to proceed with specific planning conditions attached. For example, the previously delayed Cambridge Cancer Research Hospital was approved in August 2024 with conditions around building standards and consumption monitoring. However, broader constraints are set to continue until new supply schemes become operational. This situation creates a complex balancing act, particularly in relation to other water-intensive national targets, such as the 2021 Hydrogen Strategy’s ambition for 10GW of low-carbon hydrogen by 2030, some of which might be located in energy hubs in the region.
Heat from Housing
Adding to the challenge is the Government’s plan to build 1.5 million homes by 2029. WRE noted that while its regional plan was tested against a wide range of growth and climate change scenarios to ensure it remains robust to future uncertainty, “the pace of housing growth and the Government’s plans to accelerate this could result in decisions having to be brought forward and options increased in scale.”
Mandatory housing targets are being reinstated, and a new housing formula increases targets by an average of 29% in the East of England—57% higher than historic net additions. WRE further observed that more and more new housing developments are being served by New Appointment and Variation (NAV) companies, which currently have weak incentives to manage water consumption and leakage within their supply areas. For instance, there are “no plans for smart metering” unlike at regional water companies.
Speaking at the progress report’s launch webinar, Paul Mumford, a WRE board member and project director at Urban & Civic (which prepares land for developers), expressed repeated “nervousness” about the housing industry’s prospects in such a dry area.
Anglian Water has recently called on the Government to consider water and wastewater capacity as part of the new town decision-making process. While supportive of housebuilding ambitions and set to invest £11bn in 2025-30, including in the development of two new reservoirs, Anglian Water pointed out that new town development in its region would exceed the growth forecasted in its investment plan. “As a result, there is a risk that a new town could be proposed in an area which does not have the capacity to provide water services without increasing the risk of harm to the environment or communities from flooding and pollution incidents,” the company stated.
Figure 1: Pressure on the water environment from a lack of flows Figure 2: Local authority housing targets under new formula
WRE was commissioned by the Government to develop higher growth scenarios for the Greater Cambridge region. Its analysis showed that water efficiency standards in new developments are crucial. “Otherwise, the higher growth scenarios would require significant new volumes of water to be found and transferred to the Cambridge Water area to enable accelerated growth to take place.”
When asked whether current environmental destination ambitions are still feasible, given the intensified focus on growth—especially in hotspots like Cambridge—WRE responded: “We’re going to work on exactly that question.”
The Year Ahead
More broadly, WRE stated that work on developing a second regional plan is already underway, though the timetable and funding for its multi-sector remit are yet to be finalized.
Among its priorities for 2025, WRE listed: further environmental investigations; supporting the innovative solutions being identified through Local Resource Option studies; further progress on strategic infrastructure projects; scaling up smart metering and water efficiency programs; continued engagement with the energy, navigation, leisure, and industrial sectors; and influencing key policy initiatives.
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