The Great Drought Divide of Britain
The South is arid, but the North has water to spare
WITH hosepipe bans looming, here’s a sight to make millions of gardeners in certain areas of the country green with envy.
A walker shelters under their umbrella as a sheet of water hurtles down the overflow cascade of a well- stocked reservoir.
Yet just 50 miles away from the scene at Thrus cross Reservoir in North Yorkshire is the drought zone, with residents in Doncaster, Hull and Scarborough blighted by arid conditions.
While a swathe of southern and eastern England is being forced to prepare for a summer of water restrictions, water remains as plentiful as ever in much of the North.
The imbalance shows no sign of abating after yet another week with no rain amid a mini-heatwave that made for the sunniest March since 1929, the year of the Wall Street Crash.
After two dry winters, reservoir levels are below normal across the country and in some cases extremely low. Swithland in Leicestershire is holding just 39.6 per cent of capacity, and Ogston in Derbyshire has plummeted to 53 per cent.
Reservoirs at Bewl in Kent and Ardingly in West Sussex have been urgently refilled from already-low rivers, but are still only up to 50 per cent.
It was a stark contrast to the scenes at Cow Green Reservoir, in County Durham, where excess water was blasting out of valve pipes. And in north and west Cumbria, reservoir levels are holding a very healthy 99.6 per cent of capacity – after February floods deluged roads.
Seven water firms are imposing hosepipe bans from Thursday, affecting 20million people in the South and East of England.
It again raises the question of creating a national water grid to transport supplies from plentiful areas to where they are needed.
The idea was first proposed in the early 1970s, but it was thought to be too fraught with logistical problems.
Dr Barnaby Smith of the Centre for Ecology and Hydrology said: ‘There are issues to consider, as water has a different chemical composition in the North and the South which can affect the ecosystem. But following privatisation and devolution it is now more important than ever that we have a water instability plan for the whole country.’
As Britain heads into the driest six months of the year, suppliers have warned restrictions are likely to last until October.
While forecasters have warned cold weather and even snow are on the way from tomorrow night, even weeks of rain wouldn’t be enough to remedy the drought conditions in the South and East.
With hosepipe bans forecast to become more common in future summers, experts say gardeners may have to change their strategy, replacing traditional English blooms with drought-resistant plants such as cacti.
One such garden has been created by the Royal Horticultural Society at Hyde Hall, Essex, one of the driest places in the UK.
It gets just 24 inches of rain a year, less than Jerusalem and Beirut – yet curator Ian Le Gros says it hasn’t needed a hosepipe or watering can for 11 years.