Experts warn accurately monitoring consumption by bulk users such as farmers, datacentres and businesses can be all but impossible
emand for water is rising fast but England’s system for tracking water use is outdated, patchy and opaque, leaving regulators in the dark, and can even reward businesses for using more, experts have warned.
Water licensed for farming has more than doubled in five years, from nearly 3 billion cubic metres in 2015–2019 to almost 6 billion between 2020 and 2024. The energy sector’s use has also soared, with the sector’s annual demand rising from 4.1 billion cubic metres in 2013 to 7.3 billion in 2023, a joint investigation by the Guardian and Watershed Investigations revealed.
Part of the rise reflects previously unlicensed activities now entering the system. The Crown and Government category, which includes the Ministry of Defence, had no recorded volumes before 2021, but by 2023 had reached nearly 3 million cubic metres.
Some water use is classed as non-consumptive, such as navigation or power station cooling, because it is returned shortly after use.
