Water Transfers – RAPID SRO Submissions
Water companies are developing plans to ensure there is enough water in the future to meet the challenges of climate change and population growth, while also seeking to protect the natural environment. One of the potential solutions is to transfer water between different areas of the country through projects known as Strategic Resource Options (SRO), moving water from areas where and when it is available and sharing it with areas experiencing a shortfall in supply.
As part of the 2019 price review, Ofwat has worked with water companies to develop this SRO Programme. United Utilities (UU) has been part of that programme, working closely with our regulators to ensure a truly collaborative approach in the development of the national water resource solutions. The SRO Programme includes a number of schemes whose feasibility will be assessed and funded during AMP7 (2020-2025). This will enable the right portfolio of projects to be selected by Water Resource Regional Plans, ready for implementation in AMP8 (2025-2030) and beyond.
UU are involved in two SRO schemes:-
- Severn to Thames Transfer (STT SRO) which involves the transfer of raw water from the River Severn to the River Thames through a new interconnector (joint activity with Severn Trent Water & Thames Water);
- North West Transfer (NWT SRO) which includes the development of new water sources to offset water made available for transfer and enabling works on part of our distribution system – the Vyrnwy Aqueduct – to maintain supply resilience. The NWT SRO was formed at Gate 1 from combining two previous interdependent SROs – UU Sources and Vyrnwy Aqueduct.
In order to facilitate the SRO Programme, Ofwat have formed the Regulators’ Alliance for Progressing Infrastructure Development (RAPID) which brings together the three English water regulators Ofwat, Environment Agency (EA) and Drinking Water Inspectorate (DWI) along with representation from Natural Resources Wales (NRW). RAPID have introduced a gated process to assess SROs during AMP7, with the first gate in July 2021 and the second gate in November 2022. This process aims to ensure the best value SROs are selected for delivery.
The Gate 1 and 2 submissions for the SRO schemes UU are participating in can be viewed below.
STT-G2-S3-112-1 Physical Envrionment Workbook - 20221011 and STT-G2-S3-113-1 Waterquality Assessment Supporting Workbooks 2-221-11 are avaliable on request