The Environment Agency has agreed a Drought Permit to help refill the South East’s largest reservoir following the driest 12 months since 1976.

Bewl Water, in Lamberhurst, Kent, was only 40 per cent full in February. Normally at that time of year it would be nearer 90 per cent.

We applied to the agency for emergency powers to help refill it, allowing it to take more water from the River Medway, under certain conditions.

Meyrick Gough, Water Planning and Strategy Manager, said: “Kent is experiencing the driest 10 months since 1888 so we welcome the Environment Agency’s decision to allow us to pump more water into Bewl in time for the summer.

The reservoir is a key resource. It supplies not only Southern Water’s customers in the Medway towns, Thanet and Hastings but is also used by other water companies.

Therefore, it is vital that we can put more water into it - we would like to see it reach levels of 70 per cent before the end of March.

However, we still require more rain to help replenish our underground sources and continue to ask customers to use water wisely and look on our website for advice on how to do this.”

Every year, water from the Medway is used to top up Bewl reservoir. Previously, we could not take water from the river if the flow rate had dropped below the 275 million litres per day level, which is set in the current licence agreement. The Drought Permit allows us to continue taking water from the river until the flow rate of the river drops to 100 million litres per day, between the day the permit is granted and March 31. We must apply for a permit extension if it wants to continue after this date.

If you would like to know more about the conditions of the Drought Permit you can view the document here.

We continue to manage our resources carefully with:

• An ongoing leak reduction programme, which has resulted in us recording our lowest leakage levels in four years (figures from September 2011 to February 2012). £20 million was invested in both 2010/11 and 2011/12, and £15.5 million has been earmarked for 2012/13.
• A mains replacement programme to replace 52km of pipes in 2010/11, 75km in 2011/12 and 256km before 2015. This work will reduce the risk of burst pipes and leaks.
• A five year metering programme which will see 500,000 new water meters, equipped with leak alarms, installed for the majority of our customers in the South East by 2015. People on water meters tend to use 10 per cent less water. The leak alarms are expected to save up to five million litres of water per day. To date, more than 130,000 meters have been installed across Hampshire, Sussex and Kent under the programme.

We are asking our customers to think about how they can help the situation and avoid wasting water. View our water efficiency tips and details of the company’s Save Water, Save Energy, Save Money campaign.