There has been a lot in the news in recent months about the water shortage England is facing and how we all need to do our part to reduce our water usage and save this precious resource when we can.
But how much do you know about where England’s tap water comes from and how it gets from the source to our properties? Many of us rarely think about where our water is sourced from because it is so readily available from our taps.
Understanding more about the various sources of England’s tap water can help all of us make more conscious choices about water use though. For businesses, this might also mean exploring options for lower-water use appliances.
What are the main tap water sources in England?
Our tap water in England comes from a range of sources, including groundwater (which means water that’s underground), surface supplies (like lakes, rivers and reservoirs) and what the Drinking Water Inspectorate describes as mixed sources.
Where your tap water comes from specifically will depend on where you are in the country. For instance, Wessex Water, which serves Dorset and Wiltshire, uses groundwater sources for almost three-quarters of its water supply.
By contrast, Severn Trent Water, which provides water to many parts of the Midlands and the North West, gets two-thirds of its water supply from rivers and reservoirs located in regions like the Peak District, with the remainder from underground aquifers.
In England, water companies supply over 13 billion litres of water to homes and businesses every day.
How is tap water treated?
Of course, no water company can just take water from a river, reservoir or aquifer and pump it to our properties without treating it. To ensure tap water is safe for consumption, it goes through a range of stages before it makes it into the pipes that supply our businesses and homes.
Once water companies have collected the resources they need, the water is screened – this is a very simple process to remove any branches or leaves. Anything large is filtered out quickly so that it can’t damage the rest of the equipment used in the water treatment process.
The next step is to remove any particles that still remain in the water. There are two main ways in which water companies do this. One is known as flocculation, which essentially brings all the small particles still in the water together, allowing them to be removed in larger clumps.
Flocculation can be performed using chemicals or with an electro-flocculation method. The aim is to make it easier to remove the particles that remained in the water after the first screening process.
Filtration is the other way in which the water is further purified. This ensures that even the smallest particles that aren’t visible to the human eye are removed.
There are two common methods of filtration: rapid gravity filters and slow sand filters. In the former, the water is moved through a tank that is full of coarse sand. The sand traps remaining particles, while the water is able to escape.
Slow sand filters, meanwhile, are used in the next stage to remove any remaining particles that have gotten through. This process gradually filters the water through large beds of fine sand.
Finally, the water is treated with chlorine or ultraviolet to get rid of any bacteria still contained in the liquid. This ensures that it’s safe for us to consume when we get it out of our taps.
What this means for your business
Knowing where your water comes from may not change too much about your water use habits, but when we trace it all the way back to source it makes it easier to see why climate change is having such a significant impact on our water supply.
It also explains why having such a dry summer has had a serious impact on England’s water supplies and caused droughts in many places, because a lot of the sources we draw our water from simply haven’t been replenished by fresh rainwater.
This might encourage you to think about how to make water savings within your business. Are there appliances you could swap for alternatives that use less water? Or could you encourage your team to be more mindful about how much water they use in their daily tasks?
What is certain is that we can’t take our water supply for granted and therefore need to be prepared for future disruption. As a business leader, you have more control of your water supply than homeowners, because you can switch business water suppliers if you want to.
