Dry country

SIR – Daniel Bentley (Comment, November 13) calls for an increase in the rate of housebuilding, from 200,000 houses per annum to between 275,000 and 300,000.

However, an increasing problem which may render these houses unsustainable is the diminishing level of drinking water. Here in the South East, we have had very little rain since early spring. At the Bewl Water reservoir, on the border between East Sussex and Kent, most of what would once have been submerged now resembles lush grass plains. We have already had water rationing imposed on us, and rivers and aquifers are increasingly emptied by extraction during dry periods.

It will not be possible to transport meaningful quantities of water to the region due to the fact that water is extremely heavy. Even if the infrastructure were to be constructed, the pumping of water would require huge amounts of electricity at a time when the grid would already be under strain from the planned roll-out of electric vehicles. Clive Kent

Heathfield, East Sussex