FAQs

We supply an average of 520 million litres a day of high-quality tap water to a population of around 2.2 million customers across parts of Kent, Sussex, Surrey, Berkshire and Hampshire. 

To do this, we rely on there being enough clean and plentiful raw water in the rivers, streams and underground aquifers which we abstract from - for our customers, and for the environment.

We have unique challenges with the character of our supply area, which covers 5,000 square kilometres. 

More than 44 per cent of our supply area is situated within a landscape designation, such as a Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI), compared to the national average is 24 per cent. 

While this presents us with challenges, it also provides opportunities to contribute to a better environment in line with Defra’s 25 Year Environment Plan

We know that making positive, lasting change to the environment takes decades to achieve and a lifetime to maintain, so it is important to us that we set out a long-term approach to environmental planning.

This plan aligns with Defra's own 25-Year Environment Plan, but crucially, ours will be revised and updated regularly so that we are always looking ahead to the next 25 years.

Our plan provides a framework so that we can make the right decisions today, which affect the environment long-term.

In a nutshell, no - we are the first UK water company to produce such a plan and we believe it is a first in many other industries too. 

Like all water companies, our environmental performance is heavily regulated by Defra, the Environment Agency and Natural England.

Every five years, the Environment Agency and Natural England give each water company dozens of targets to meet - known as the Water Industry National Environment Programme, or WINEP.

This drives much of our work, and you can find out more on our performance microsite.

But we are now going one step further to write and deliver a plan which will not only meet, but far exceed our statutory duties.

For more about the work of our Environmental Team, visit our website.

Rather than writing our draft plan in isolation and then consulting on its contents, it was important to us to create the plan itself alongside a range of others.

That's why we held a series of workshops and other research methods to involve more than 250 of our customers, employees and stakeholders in creating this draft plan.

For more information on this process, read the Co-creating our 25-Year Environment Plan report.

We're holding a public consultation throughout April. You can take part by simply reading through our draft plan and completing our short survey on this site.

This feedback will be used to shape our draft plan into a final, published version this summer.

The aim of this consultation is to sense-check our draft and make sure that the aspirational goals and targets we have set are the right ones, and are set to be delivered at the right time. 

We are keen to not only understand the plan's areas of strength and weakness but to hear from organisations who can help us deliver this plan over the next quarter century and beyond.

Please complete our feedback survey to give us your views and let us know if you are aware of a project or initiative we could support in line with our plan.

After the public consultation closes, we will review all the feedback we received via the survey and use this to update our plan.

We will clearly document the responses received and how this shaped the plan in an extended version of our Co-creating our 25-Year Environment Plan report, available on this webpage.