Our Blueprint
for Yorkshire
Climate change
strategy
Enhancing resilience to weather
and reducing carbon emissions
December 2013
Climate
Change
Champion
“Warming of the climate system
is unequivocal, and since the
1950s, many of the observed
changes are unprecedented
over decades to millennia...
Continued emissions of
greenhouse gases will cause
further warming and changes
in all components of the
climate system.”
UN Intergovernmental Panel
on Climate Change, 20131
Foreword
There is overwhelming evidence
that our climate is changing at
an unprecedented rate. This is
critical to us and our five million
customers because our water and
waste water services are heavily
influenced by the weather.
We are working to ensure we can affordably maintain and
enhance our services in the changing climate. We are also
cost-effectively reducing our carbon footprint to play our part in
minimising future climate change. It is imperative that we respond
to the challenges presented by climate change if we are to
affordably meet our customers priorities and achieve our vision:
taking responsibility for the water environment for good.
Improving the resilience of essential utilities makes good sense.
Water and waste water customers across the UK have too often
suffered the impacts of today’s variable and extreme weather.
For instance, in 2012 the year started with drought and turned
to widespread flooding in the second half of the year. Many
homes were damaged across the UK in the floods of 2007,
including here in Yorkshire. Recent cold winters interrupted
water supplies when many parts of the UK saw pipes freeze
and burst. There is overwhelming evidence that we will face
more of these challenges as the climate changes. Across the UK
there is evidence that water and waste water services need to
become more resilient to the challenges from the weather of
today and tomorrow.
In Yorkshire, we have maintained our water and waste
water services throughout a range of recent extreme events.
Our flexible water grid gives us one of the most resilient
water services in the UK by enabling us to move water
around our region. We are proud not to have implemented
a hosepipe ban in our region since 1996.
03 | Foreword
Our customers have told us they want us to maintain service
whatever the weather. Variable and extreme weather
presents a high and increasing risk to our services, and causes
unplanned financial costs and reputational damage. We are
adapting our business by enhancing resilience to today’s
extreme weather and ensuring we can maintain affordable
services as the climate changes over the long-term.
To help mitigate the effects of future climate change we are
supporting international efforts to reduce greenhouse gas
emissions. The large amounts of energy and resources we
use to deliver our water and waste water services result in a
substantial carbon footprint and financial cost. There are many
pressures forcing growth in our emissions and we are working
hard to reduce them, delivering an 8% reduction over the last
two years. Our ability to achieve the Carbon Trust Standard
is testament to our strong performance in this area. We
have great scope to generate renewable electricity to reduce
emissions, keep water bills low and support domestic energy
resilience. We want to maximise the benefits we can offer
society from our assets and infrastructure.
Having reviewed the latest evidence and assessed our climate
change risks we published our climate change position
paper in July 2012. I am now pleased to publish our climate
change strategy having enhanced our risk understanding
and integrated climate change thinking into our business
planning. We look forward to working in partnership with
our customers, government, regulators and many other
stakeholders to minimise the cost and maximise the benefits
as we deliver our climate change strategy to maintain
affordable water and waste water services for our customers.
Richard Flint,
Chief Executive of Yorkshire Water
Contents
Using this document
05
Introduction and executive summary
07
The current and future climate
12
Part A: Communication and collaboration
14
A1: Securing customer, regulator and stakeholder support
A2: Shaping customer and stakeholder behaviour
A3: Supporting effective legislation and regulation
A4: Empowering our people and partners
Part B: Adaptation
B1: Maintaining excellent drinking water quality
B2: Ensuring sufficient water supplies
B3: Protecting people and the environment from sewer flooding
B4: Improving the environment
B5: Enhancing the resilience of our critical assets and services
B6: Keeping bills affordable
Part C: Mitigation
C1: Understanding our emissions
C2: Minimising emissions from our use of electricity
C3: Reducing our other operational emissions
C4: Managing our land with greenhouse gasses in mind
C5: Working in partnership with our supply chain
16
22
24
26
28
30
34
42
47
50
55
58
60
62
68
70
75
Glossary and References
77
Appendix
80
Appendix 1 – Strategic climate change risk register
Appendix 2 – Data and guidance used to develop our climate change strategy
Appendix 3 – Overview of expenditure to meet environmental quality obligations
04 | Contents
81
92
94
Using this document
We have designed this document to help you
focus on the topics that interest you most.
Choose the level of detail you want
The main document is in three parts: Adaptation
Mitigation and Communication .
,
Each part includes sections on a priority topic of our climate
change strategy. Each section is written to stand alone, starts
with a summary box of key points and references further
information where it is available.
Hear what our customers and
stakeholders have to say
We demonstrate our customers and stakeholders support
for our plans. Quote boxes throughout the document provide
an insight into the ‘customer and stakeholder voice’. We also
provide an overview of customer and stakeholder views in
section A1.
Important
terminology
Weather
The day-to-day temperature, rainfall and
wind conditions.
Climate
The average weather experienced over
a period of time, usually 30 years.
Climate change
Understand our risks, current
position and future targets
Long-term change to the average weather. In
this context we mean the unprecedented rate of
change to weather being observed in recent times.
Each section includes a summary of the relevant risks from
our strategic climate change risk register. This shows our
assessment of the risk severity and likelihood (red, amber,
green) at timescales through to the 2080s. A full summary
of the register is in Appendix 1 . Each section also includes
a ‘monitoring our progress’ box which describes the measures
we are using to track our performance in delivering our strategy.
Greenhouse gas and carbon
We have used arrows to indicate general trends in both our
risk profile over time and our performance on the measures
we have identified:
A range of greenhouse gasses like carbon dioxide,
methane and nitrous oxides contribute to climate
change. Carbon is often used as shorthand
to mean all greenhouse gasses.
Adaptation
Action to prepare for climate change.
Mitigation
Action to reduce future climate change.
Resilience
The ability to withstand a hazard.
Getting better
Little change Getting worse
Find more in the Glossary
We welcome your feedback
and questions
To discuss our climate change
strategy please contact:
Gordon Rogers
Climate Change Strategy Manager
T: 01274 804549
E: [email protected]
05 | Using this document
This icon is a link to other
sections within this document.
Enjoying Yorkshire’s
‘Coast to Boast about’
“Research is showing how
human activity has changed the
odds of certain extreme weather
events or seasons happening.
For example, human emissions
of greenhouse gasses mean that
the chances of experiencing a
summer as hot as the European
heatwave of 2003 were found to
have at least doubled.”
Met Office, 20132
Introduction and executive summary | 6
Introduction and
executive summary
We are at the forefront of
responding to climate change
because our water and waste
water services are heavily
influenced by the weather.
Stakeholder voice
“We support your
integration of climate
change and resilience
measures across
all weather dependant
aspects of your
Business Plan.”
We already manage the impacts of today’s variable and
extreme weather. Our risk assessment shows how such
impacts will grow as climate change brings more severe
weather events. Climate change is one of our biggest
challenges and a long-term business priority.
Climate change threatens our ability to deliver the
services our customers tell us they expect from us. We
have worked with our customers to identify the priorities
they want from us over the long-term. We call these our
seven outcomes for Yorkshire.
Environment Agency, 20133
Outcomes for Yorkshire
We provide you with
water that is clean
and safe to drink
We protect
and improve
the water
environment
We make sure that
you always have
enough water
We understand
our impact on the
wider environment
and act responsibly
07 | Introduction and executive summary
We take care of your waste
water and protect you and the
environment from sewer flooding
We provide the
level of customer
service you
expect and value
We keep your
bills as low
as possible
We assessed the latest evidence, opportunities
and risks for our climate change position paper
in July 2012. This is available on our website at
yorkshirewater.com/climatechange . We made
the following conclusions and commitments:
• The climate has been changing and will continue
to change
• Climate change presents risks to our strategic
objectives and the services we provide
• We will quantify the climate change risks that face
our business
• We will develop long-term plans to manage climate
change risks that face our business
• We will promote activities to address our climate
change risks
• We will drive initiatives to empower every employee
to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and
prepare for the changing climate.
Since then we have made notable progress on our
commitments by looking at our risks in detail. We are
now pleased to publish our climate change strategy.
Our strategy describes how we are working to affordably
maintain and enhance our water and waste water services,
and to cost-effectively reduce our carbon footprint.
The action we set out in our climate change strategy ensures
we are effectively managing today’s risks and laying the
necessary foundations to affordably maintain services for the
long-term. It is imperative that we respond to the challenges
presented by climate change if we are to affordably meet
our customers priorities and achieve our vision: taking
responsibility for the water environment for good.
Part A: Communication
and collaboration
To secure the best results by working in partnership.
This underpins every aspect of our approach to climate
change because everyone has a role in ensuring water
use is sustainable.
Section A1: Securing customer, regulator and
stakeholder support is necessary because we are
regulated to deliver defined levels of service at a cost
customers are willing and able to pay. We have secured
high levels of customer and stakeholder support for our
Business Plan for 2015-2020. We think there is a need for
mature national debate about how we most effectively
fund the long-term customer expectations of the water
and waste water industry.
Section A2: Shaping customer and stakeholder
behaviour will minimise the scale of our climate
change challenge. We are working to encourage
sustainable behaviours on water consumption, waste
disposal and land management.
Section A3: Supporting effective legislation and
regulation will support more effective adaptation
and mitigation. We observe opportunities and will
continue to share our knowledge, evidence and ideas
with policy makers.
Section A4: Empowering our people and
partners to reduce GHG emissions and prepare for
the changing climate, because everyone who works with
us has an important role to play.
Part B: Adaptation
A holistic strategy that is
integrated in our Business Plan
To affordably maintain and enhance services by improving
resilience to today’s extreme weather and preparing for
future climate change.
We have integrated our climate change needs into our
recently published Business Plan for the period 2015-2020.
Our climate change strategy is in three parts that each have
a number of sections which together tackle every aspect of
our climate change challenge.
Section B1: Maintaining excellent drinking water
quality is getting harder because of unsustainable land
use practices and climate change. We are responding to
imminent risks by enhancing our treatment works and
operational activities. We are also working in partnership to
tackle the issue at source through catchment management.
Climate change strategy
Adaptation
Mitigation
Communication
08 | Introduction and executive summary
Section B2: Ensuring sufficient water supplies is at
risk from drier conditions expected in the changing climate.
This is our most mature area of current resilience and future
planning. Our Water Resources Management Plan and Drought
Plan set out the range of options we are using to manage
emergencies, the long-term climate trends and other pressures.
Section B3: Protecting people and the environment
from sewer flooding is a growing challenge because
of heavier rainfall events and urban development. We work
with other flood management authorities to ensure an
integrated, cost-effective response to regional flooding issues.
We are evolving our approach by using advanced hydraulic
modelling and broadening our portfolio of potential response
options to include Sustainable Drainage Systems (SuDS) and
modular designs.
Ramblers enjoying Yorkshire’s
iconic moorlands
Section B4: Improving the environment is a priority
as healthy species and habitats are most able to resist
climate change and other pressures. We continue to deliver
improvements in river and coastal water quality by enhancing
our waste water treatment capabilities. We also continue to
restore large areas of our own land and work with others to
protect their land.
Section B5: Enhancing the resilience of our critical assets
and services to any hazard is an important part of our
ability to maintain services in emergencies like extreme weather
events. We have quantified the risk to our assets and services
from hazards including drought, fluvial flooding and coastal
erosion. In the short-term, we will enhance our resilience
through a small number of priority interventions. We want to
go further when the economic climate allows.
Section B6: Keeping bills affordable will be a challenge
because we face many long-term cost pressures and anticipate
that action will need to escalate over time in response to
worsening climate change. In the short-term, to 2020, we
and our customers have made some hard choices to manage
today’s risks and prepare for the long-term while ensuring bills
do not rise above inflation.
Part C: Mitigation
To cost-effectively reduce GHG emissions to play our
part in minimising future climate change.
Section C1: Understanding our emissions is a
precursor to their effective reduction. Water and waste
water treatment and distribution activities are energy and
emissions intensive. We have reduced our operational
emissions by 8% over the last two years and our ability
to secure the Carbon Trust Standard demonstrates our
success in this area. Our emissions face increasing pressure
from population growth and new legislative requirements.
09 | Introduction and executive summary
Section C2: Minimising emissions from our use of
electricity is a mitigation priority because it is our
largest source of emissions. We have reduced our total
electricity consumption by 5.3% since 2010/11. Our
land and infrastructure could support a wide range of
technically-feasible and cost-effective renewable generation
activities. Our customers cannot afford the upfront capital
cost in the current economic climate, so we are seeking
alternative funding options. We would like stronger legislative
and regulatory incentives to help us maximise the benefit
we can provide society, for example an industry-specific
emissions reduction target.
Section C3: Reducing our other operational emissions
is important because nothing can be ignored if we are to meet
the levels of reduction needed to effectively curb future climate
change. We take action on every source of our emissions,
including transport, fuels and those emissions released during
our biological treatment processes.
Section C4: Managing our land with greenhouse gasses
in mind is a critical part of our climate change strategy
because we own large amounts of carbon-rich peat moorlands
and woodland. We are working in partnership to improve the
management of our own and other people’s land. We were
pleased to support the Adaptation Sub-Committee (20134) in
their recent work and support their three recommendations
to government: “(i) set an explicit policy goal to increase the
area under restoration, (ii) review the enforcement of current
regulations, and (iii) improve incentives for landowners to invest
in restoration”.
Section C5: Working in partnership with our supply
chain to ensure emissions are effectively considered in
the design and build of new assets and infrastructure, and in
procurement of goods, materials and services.
A risk based strategy to protect
water and waste water services
We have sought a measured, proportionate and risk based
approach to create a robust climate change strategy. Responding
to government and regulatory expectation, we have completed
a suite of detailed risk assessments and quantified our risk
position in many of our priority areas. We have also assessed the
range of options we can use to cost-effectively respond to our
risks and reduce our carbon footprint.
We have provided an overview summary of our latest climate
change risk assessment and response plans in Appendix 1 .
This shows our risk position in four time-steps through to the
2080s. We have assessed our risks as we stand at the time
of publication (Winter 2013) and our anticipated position
after the delivery of the actions we have incorporated into
our Business Plan (2020).
We have defined a series of principles to ensure the right
approach throughout our climate change strategy and have
ensured our principles align with those that others have
described in a number of external publications, such as the
Office of Water Services (Ofwat) ‘Principles for resilience
planning’ (20127). Our underlying principles are summarised
in three themes.
1. Using the best available evidence and methodologies
2. Balancing the needs of today and the long-term
3. Collaborating for the most effective result
We provide more details on the data, guidance and principles
used to develop our strategy in Appendix 2 .
A resilient and sustainable strategy
Our risk assessment and climate change strategy has used
the latest and best available evidence, including the UK
Climate Projections 2009 (UKCP09) and other credible
information like the National Coastal Erosion Risk Maps
(NCERM) and Environment Agency (EA) flood maps. This
is supplemented by detailed local data on topography and
the historic performance of our assets.
Our climate change strategy is a balanced one. It recognises
the necessity and many benefits of cost-effective and targeted
early action; using the best available evidence and continuing to
develop our understanding; and, the ability and willingness of
our customers to fund activities in the current economic climate.
In each part of our strategy we explain the action we will take
to affordably maintain and enhance our water and waste water
services, and to cost-effectively reduce our carbon footprint.
We have followed the latest national guidance, including the
Cabinet Office resilience guide ‘Keeping the country running’
(20115) and the EA’s ‘Advice for flood and coastal erosion risk
management authorities’ (20116). The Cabinet Office guide
highlights a four box model of the ‘components for effective
infrastructure resilience’. The model demonstrates that both
investment and operational responses are needed to cost
effectively deliver effective resilience. We have used this model
to develop the weather resilience options within our strategy,
ensuring action in all four components.
We have planned in detail to 2020, to ensure we can act
with certainty to manage imminent risks and lay necessary
foundations for sustainable water and waste water services.
We have also made provisional plans for the long-term and
will periodically update our strategy to ensure our approach
evolves with developing knowledge. On page 11 we have
mapped our headline actions to the Cabinet Office four
components for effective infrastructure resilience, as described
above. A more detailed summary of our response to each of
our climate change risks can be found in Appendix 1 .
The Cabinet Office model for
effective infrastructure resilience
A flexible strategy that will
remain fit for the future
Resistance
Protection to
withstand a hazard
(e.g. a flood wall)
Reliability
The ability of an asset
to operate in a range
of conditions
(e.g. asset design)
Infrastructure
resilience
Redundancy
Design capacity
into a system
(e.g. backup pumps)
Response
and recovery
Enabling fast and
effective response to, and
recovery from, an event
(e.g. emergency planning)
Our strategy will evolve over time because climate change is
a long-term issue and knowledge continues to evolve rapidly,
both internally and externally. We will use risk assessment
based on the latest evidence, and external engagement,
to inform the details of our future approach. We have
already identified many potential future actions beyond our
next Business Plan period which runs to 2020. We are not
progressing these actions sooner because they were either
not necessary yet, are unaffordable, received insufficient
customer support and/or needed further knowledge to
enable us to act with confidence. We will continue to assess
our needs and consider these further actions. Many are likely
to become a high priority in the future.
We have identified a series of measures that will help us
monitor our priority risks over time. Tracking our performance
will help us ensure our strategy is effectively supporting our
ability to achieve the outcomes our customers expect from
us. Details of these measures are provided in each section
of this document.
To ensure effective planning and to inform debate we will
maintain our strategy and regularly share information to remain
transparent about our approach.
10 | Introduction and executive summary
Our climate change strategy is ensuring effective infrastructure resilience
Resistance
Protection to withstand a hazard
Reducing water demand to better withstand drought,
for example by further reducing leakage and installing
water meters.
Catchment management to protect raw water
quality and reduce GHG emissions by helping habitats
and species to withstand climate change and
other pressures.
Improved protection of critical assets to maintain
services despite extreme weather and coastal erosion.
For example relocating Withernsea Waste Water
Treatment Works.
Customer engagement to encourage water
efficiency to help avoid shortages in dry periods, and
promote sewer-friendly behaviours to avoid flooding.
Reducing GHG emissions to curb the impact of
future climate change, for example through energy
efficiency and renewable generation.
Redundancy
Designing capacity into a system
Enhancing water treatment capability to cope
with deteriorating raw water quality in the changing
climate. For example at Rivelin and Langsett Water
Treatment Works.
Managing water network capacity to reduce the risk
of supply interruption in extreme weather.
Enhancing waste water treatment capability to
protect the environment ready for the pressures of
climate change. For example, enhancing waste water
treatment to reduce ammonia, Biological Oxygen
Demand and phosphorus in discharges to river.
Managing sewer network capacity to reduce the risk
of sewer flooding and pollution during periods of heavy
rainfall. For example, protecting a further 400 properties
at risk from sewer flooding by 2020.
Reliability
The ability of an asset to operate
in a range of conditions
Maintenance to ensure assets are functioning as
designed and ready for extreme weather.
Design standards to ensure new assets are built for
the long-term. We keep our design standards and
engineering specifications under regular review.
Increasing water supply options for times of peak
demand. For example new water supply pipelines are
a long-term option.
Innovation to increase our scope to respond to
priority risks and opportunities. For example, advanced
technologies to significantly increase the energy we
can take from sewage. A storm water management
strategy will investigate how we can best use Sustainable
Drainage Solutions (SuDS) and other techniques.
Response and Recovery
Enabling fast and effective
response to, and recovery from,
an event
Emergency planning and equipment to improve our
readiness for the most extreme events. For example
demountable flood defences and multi-agency training
exercises.
Stakeholder engagement to ensure an efficient and
effective approach to our region’s overall preparedness,
for example, with Lead Local Flood Authorities, the EA
and emergency responders.
Mutual aid agreement with other water companies to
share resources in times of need.
Modelling and knowledge development to inform
our future response. For example modelling our drainage
network to help identify problems and solutions.
Insurance to support the costs of loss or damage we
might incur as a result of extreme events.
11 | Introduction and executive summary
The current and
future climate
There is compelling scientific agreement that the climate is
changing at an unprecedented rate. The majority of evidence
shows trends for gradual warming, changing precipitation
patterns, sea level rise and more frequent, more severe extreme
weather events. We provide an overview of the latest evidence
below and provide more details on our website in our July
2012 climate change position paper, which is available at
yorkshirewater.com/climatechange .
Climate change is already happening
There is increasing evidence that greenhouse gas emissions
have already influenced weather and climate over recent
decades. For example:
• There is a clear trend of increasing global temperature
from the late 1970s onwards (Met Office, 20108).
• The global average sea level has risen by between 10 cm
and 20 cm during the past century. At North Shields the
trend displays a rise throughout the 20th century of about
2 mm per year (National Oceanographic Centre9).
• Emissions significantly increased the chance of the heavy
rainfall which led to the floods in the UK in Autumn 2000
(University of Oxford, 201110). The rainfall was the wettest
recorded, with the river Ouse reaching its highest levels
since the 1600s (Met Office11).
12 | The current and future climate
Further climate change is inevitable
Even if emissions stopped today, the climate would change
for at least the next 40 years due to those emissions already
released (Acclimatise and UKCIP, 200612). The 2009 UK
climate projections (UKCP09) are the best evidence for
practitioners in the UK. This shows that levels of climate
change will increase in severity through the 21st century:
Changing precipitation patterns
• Precipitation will become more seasonal, with an
increase expected in winter and a decrease in summer.
• Dry spells will increase in frequency.
• Rainfall events will get heavier and/or longer.
Rising sea levels
• Sea levels will rise by up to 25 cm by 2030 and 41 cm
by 2050 on the Yorkshire coast (95 percentile, high
emissions scenario).
Warmer temperatures, but maybe colder winters
• Both summer and winter temperatures will increase.
• Heatwaves will become more frequent.
• Sub-zero temperatures decrease in frequency in the
UKCP09. However, more recent research has found that
progressive shrinking of Arctic Sea ice is bringing colder,
snowier winters to the UK, Europe, North America
and China (Georgia Institute of Technology and Beijing
Institute of Atmospheric Physics, 201213). This confirms
the science continues to evolve rapidly on the detail
of the expected change, but there is little doubt that
change is happening faster than ever seen before over
recent millennia.
“Continued emissions of
greenhouse gases will cause
further warming and changes
in all components of the climate
system... the contrast in
precipitation between wet and
dry regions and between wet
and dry seasons will increase...”
UN Intergovernmental
Panel on Climate Change, 20131
Making the most of every drop of
Yorkshire’s precious water resource
Part A:
Communication
and collaboration
Working in partnership to
deliver the most effective
response to climate change
Spreading the water
efficiency message
Introduction
Communication and collaboration underpins every aspect
of our climate change strategy because everyone has a role
to play in the future of water: customers, the government,
regulators, our delivery partners and many other stakeholders.
We cannot effectively respond to climate change in isolation.
To deliver the biggest benefits for society and the most
cost-effective approach we need to listen, be heard, and
work with others. Over the following pages we examine
each of the following communication topics, describing our
recent performance and future plans:
A1: Securing customer, regulator and stakeholder
support is essential as we are regulated to deliver services
to the standards that our customers expect, at a cost they
are willing and able to pay.
A2: Shaping customer and stakeholder behaviour
plays a critical role in determining the scale of the challenge,
for example water consumers help determine the volume of
water needed and land managers influence water quality.
15 | Part A: Communication and collaboration
A3: Supporting effective legislation and regulation
is necessary to ensure we and others are appropriately
supported and bound to meet the needs of society.
A4: Empowering our people because everyone has
a role to play in reducing greenhouse gas emissions and
preparing for the changing climate.
Further details and examples of our communication,
collaboration and partnership are provided throughout the
Adaptation and Mitigation parts of this document.
There are also specific sections on how we work with our
supply chain to ensure resilience (section B5 ) and lowcarbon purchases and capital investment (section C5 ).
A1: Securing customer, regulator and stakeholder support
Section summary
• The Water Industry’s economic regulator, the Office
of Water Services (Ofwat), determines price limits every
five years. To inform this process we submit a Business
Plan of the activities we will undertake to maintain and
enhance services, and the associated costs. We submitted
our plan for the period 2015-2020 to Ofwat in December
2013. We have integrated climate change throughout
our plan in line with guidance from the government,
Ofwat and others.
• We have demonstrated customer and stakeholder
support for our plan. We provide an overview of our
customer research in this section, with further insight
throughout the document in quotation boxes titled
‘customer and stakeholder voice’.
• We recognise the potential for future conflict. Climate
change is likely to increase operating costs and our
customers tell us they expect us to maintain and enhance
services, but many cannot or do not want to pay more.
We think there is a need for mature national debate about
how we most effectively fund the long-term customer
expectations of the water and waste water industry.
Main climate change risks being addressed (full details in Appendix 1
2013: As we stand today
Risk title
Trend
2013
2030s 2050s 2080s
)
2020: After our next
round of risk mitigation
2020
2030s 2050s 2080s
B1: Inability to
secure approval
High risk
Medium risk
Risk
understanding
2012
2013
Med
Med
Low risk
Outcomes being supported
We provide you with water that is clean and safe to drink
We make sure that you always have enough water
We take care of your waste water and protect you and the environment from sewer flooding
We provide the level of customer service you expect and value
Progress measure for this theme of action
Measure:
Current performance:
Future target:
Percentage of customers that support our strategic Business Plan
76% of domestic and 85% of business customers (2013/14)
To maintain or enhance levels of support
Sharing information
through our website
16 | Part A: Communication and collaboration
Hilary Benn MP and young customers
at our education centre in Bradford
Our Catchment Manager working with the
Head Gamekeeper of the Bolton Abbey Estate
A1.1: Securing support from the
government and our regulators
The UK water industry is closely regulated to protect society’s
interests. At the heart of the regulatory framework is a five
yearly Price Review process that requires water companies to
produce Business Plans detailing how they will achieve their
legal requirements and customers’ expectations. In producing
these plans, water companies consult with customers to
determine the levels of service they expect and are willing and
able to fund. Plans must also be based on risk assessment and
robust evidence. The plans are submitted to the industry’s
economic regulator, Ofwat, to determine limits on customer
prices. Through these controls and requirements, the Price
Review plays a fundamental role in shaping our approach to
climate change.
Stakeholder voice
“Water companies are
expected to plan for
mitigating and adapting
to the impacts of climate
change over the next decades.”
Defra, 201214
17 | Part A: Communication and collaboration
Other regulators have essential roles in defining our Business
Plan, including the Consumer Council for Water (CCW),
Drinking Water Inspectorate (DWI), Environment Agency (EA),
and Natural England (NE). Our regulators work within a legal
and policy framework set by the government, particularly the
Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra).
All of these organisations have expressed the need for the
water industry to recognise the growing pressures from climate
change and ensure an appropriate response.
We believe the Price Review process supports an effective
approach to climate change by enabling an adaptive ‘check
and re-align’ approach every five years and using robust risk
and evidence based decision making. It helps the industry and
its regulators to manage future uncertainties, including those
inherent in planning for the future climate. We cannot allow
uncertainty to become a barrier to necessary adaptation
and mitigation activities because inaction itself would be a
growing risk and there are firm expectations for the industry
to enhance resilience to weather and reduce greenhouse gas
(GHG) emissions.
We have integrated climate change factors into weatherdependant decisions throughout our Business Plan and we have
identified cost-effective steps to contribute to government GHG
targets. We describe overleaf how we have confirmed support
for our Business Plan from our customers and stakeholders
through extensive engagement and consultation. In December
2013, water companies submitted their Business Plans to Ofwat
for the upcoming period from 2015-2020. These plans and the
associated customer prices will be ‘determined’ by Ofwat during
2014/15. If the determination process results in any substantial
change to our Business Plan we will reassess our ability to
manage climate change risks in the short-term to 2020.
A1.2: Securing support from our
customers and stakeholders
The views and support of our customers is essential
to our climate change strategy. This is for three
main reasons:
1. Customers fund our activities, so it is right and fair that
they have a strong voice in shaping our plans.
2. Regulation requires us to deliver services to the standards
that our customers expect and are willing and able to fund.
3. Customer and stakeholder behaviours help determine the
scale of our climate change impact and response needs.
The majority of our customers accept that climate
change is a reality
Latest research by us and others finds that the majority of
people surveyed agree climate change is happening and
that this presents important risks to the UK. However,
many remain poorly informed of the evidence and there is
a sizeable minority who are sceptical, especially about linking
human activity to climate change. Customers voice confusion
over the conflict between theory for hotter, drier summers
and recent trends for cold and wet weather.
Here’s how a range of our customers ranked the
most important environmental issues:
1. Increasing population
2. Waste/landfill sites
Stakeholder voice
“Principle 1: Water companies
should deliver outcomes that
customers and society value, at
a price they are willing to pay.”
Ofwat, 201115
3. Energy consumption
4. Climate change & greenhouse gasses
5. Wildlife habitat destruction
6. Pollution
7. Water shortages (Our research, 201216)
Over 60% agreed that “climate change is definitely
happening” and are “concerned about the effects”.
(Our research, 201217).
Nationally, “the majority of participants felt that in their
lifetimes they had experienced long-term changes in the UK
weather (80%) and over two-thirds (69%) agreed that the UK
would experience more extreme weather events by 2050.”
(Defra, 201318).
We have undertaken a range of consultation and engagement
exercises with customers to understand their priorities, hear
their feedback on our Business Plan, and test their support.
We have carried out independent customer research with
6,700 domestic customers from a mix of backgrounds and
1,700 business customers. This research included a variety of
qualitative and quantitative methods that meet best practice
standards and which ensure the results are statistically
representative of our diverse customer base. We have also
reached nearly two million of our customers about our
Business Plan at roadshows and through a specially designed
interactive website.
We have worked closely with our Customer Forum throughout
our business planning process. The Forum is independently
chaired and includes representatives from a range of interest
groups including the CCW, Age Concern and our environmental
regulators. In addition we have also engaged with a wide
range of stakeholders, including charities, non-governmental
organisations (NGOs), regulators and representative bodies such
as our independent Environmental Advisory Panel (EAP). We have
also reviewed customer research carried out by Defra and Ofwat.
A summary of our customers’ views on climate change and our
Business Plan is provided below. Throughout the document we
provide insight into the perspective of customers, the government,
regulators and other stakeholders in quotation boxes. Further
details on our customer communication and research can be
found on our website at blueprintforyorkshire.com .
Helping customers at
our contact centre
Customer voice
“You can see there is going to
be a major problem.”
“I’d welcome drier summers to
end this rain we’ve been having.”
Domestic customers from Leeds and
Bridlington, 201216
18 | Part A: Communication and collaboration
Customers are confident in current and future
water services
Our research studies have found overwhelming customer trust
in the water service they receive. As a result of the high levels
of confidence, most do not give their water service a second
thought until there is a problem. There was also high confidence
that the service will continue into the future, although we found
some signs of concern. A survey of approximately 1,500 people,
including 500 from Yorkshire, found:
Customer voice
“I would be horrified if we went
backwards in terms of quality
standards.”
Domestic customer from Skipton, 201219
• Less than 20% agreed that “Water is a diminishing and
precious resource and I am very concerned about water
availability in the future in the UK.”
• Approximately 55% agreed that “Water always seems to
be there although I do sometimes worry that it may run
out in the future in the UK.”
• Over 90% trusted their water company to invest in
infrastructure, environment and future water supplies.
(Our research, 201217).
Customers expect us to maintain and enhance
services, but many cannot or will not pay more
Our customers are clear they do not want any reduction
in service, even where this could deliver cheaper bills.
There is also a clear expectation that water companies
should continue to improve services. We have worked with
our customers to identify the priorities they want from us
over the long-term. We call these our seven outcomes for
Yorkshire and they are:
We provide you with
water that is clean and
safe to drink
We take care of your
waste water and protect
you and the environment
from sewer flooding
We protect
and improve
the water
environment
We provide the level
of customer service
you expect and value
We understand
our impact on the
wider environment
and act responsibly
We make
sure that you
always have
enough water
We keep
your bills
as low as
possible
19 | Part A: Communication and collaboration
There was a variety of customer opinions about how willing
they were to pay to meet their expectations for maintained
and enhanced services. They demonstrated a lower willingness
to pay for service improvement than when last assessed five
years ago. The recognition that water bills offer the greatest
value of all household bills is balanced by a real concern
about affordability. Managing the conflict between customer
expectation and their ability and willingness to pay presents
us with a challenge. We have sought to balance customer
needs and expectations, operational performance, risk and
our ability to finance our business.
• “With very few exceptions, participants were unwilling
to consider reduced water and sewerage services. While
more frequent hosepipe bans might be acceptable to most
customers, any reduction to the core service…would be
unacceptable” (Ofwat, 201120).
• “There is public support for the UK to invest in
preparations to adapt to climate change. Public uncertainty
over the existence or the causes of climate change does
not negate this support…Nearly all workshop participants
believed that the UK should take a precautionary
approach...” (Defra, 201318).
• Less than 20% of respondents agreed “I would be willing
to pay 5% extra to a water company which is investing to
safeguard future supplies of water” (Our research, 201217).
• “Most baulked at the idea of paying ‘significantly more’ in
the future and expressed a preference (often spontaneously)
for starting to pay smaller amounts now in order for water
companies to be able to begin to put measures in place and
thereby avoid the need for more drastic increases in bills in
the future” (Ofwat, 201120).
• 24% of Yorkshire households are in water poverty today
and this is forecast to rise if we do not act. Water poverty
is defined as the proportion of households that spend
more than 3% of their disposable income (after housing
costs) on water and sewerage bills. (Our research, 201217).
Customers support our Business Plan
We have listened to our customers and incorporated their
priorities into our Business Plan. We have targeted action
where there is legal requirement or strong cost-benefit and
customer support. Our approach manages current risks and
lays the foundations for an effective, proportionate long-term
approach to climate change while ensuring bills do not rise
above inflation. Our approach will inevitably evolve over time
as knowledge develops.
Overall, 76% of domestic customers and 86% of business
customers who were surveyed support our final Business
Plan. This averages at 77% of all customers. We asked our
customers if they would like to go further in some areas,
including renewable energy and fluvial flood resilience. Many
of our customers could not support such work in the current
economic climate and we are therefore not including these
programmes in our final plan for 2015-2020. Instead we will
seek alternative ways to fund these important activities, as
we discuss in more detail in section B5 and section C2
(Our research, 201323).
Stakeholder voice
“...collectively the EAP members
are both sympathetic to, and
are supportive of, the company’s
approach to current economic
and water environment
challenges. In particular the
EAP liked the following:
• Our commitment to the
long-term future of the
water environment.
• Our overt commitment to
working in collaborative
partnerships to solve
shared challenges.
• The recognition of the
challenges arising from
climate change...”
David Stewart,
Chair of the Environmental
Advisory Panel, 201321
20 | Part A: Communication and collaboration
Finding new ways to
communicate through
our new mobile app
A1.3: Future plans for customer
and stakeholder engagement
Customer and stakeholder support is essential to the success
of our long-term climate change strategy, and consequently
to our ability to deliver the services our customers desire
from us. The costs of maintaining services in the changing
climate could be large in the long-term. Equally, we know
from experience that the cost of extreme weather events is
already significant and the cost of GHG emissions is set to
rise (DECC, 201324). To inform debate and encourage future
support we will continue to communicate with our customers
and stakeholders. We will do this through customer research,
engagement with customer and stakeholder representative
groups, and involvement in regional and national events. We
will also seek to engage directly with our customers through
communication campaigns and by providing information on
our website and through social media (see section A2 ).
We are integrating climate change throughout our standard
communication activities.
Our Biodiversity Advisor tells
customers about our new fish
pass at Rodley in Leeds
Customer voice
“Our view would be that you
have a clear mandate from the
customer base to proceed with
the current plan and that no
further research is necessary.
We will commend the approach
you have taken.”
Andrea Cook,
Chair of the Customer Forum, 201322
A2: Shaping customer and stakeholder behaviour
Section summary
• Customer and stakeholder behaviours can help or
hinder our response to climate change and thereby
our ability to deliver the services our customers desire
from us. For example, playing an important role in
the future volume of water required and the quality
of water available.
• By working in partnership we can reduce the scale
of our climate change challenge and deliver many
other benefits.
• We will encourage behavioural change through a
range of approaches, including media campaigns.
Main climate change risks being addressed (full details in Appendix 1
2013: As we stand today
Risk title
Trend
2013
2080s
2020
2030s
2050s
2080s
Risk
understanding
2013
WQ1: Land
management
Low
Med
WR1: Demand
exceeds supply
Med
High
WR2: Demand
exceeds
distribution
Low
Med
WW1:
Overloaded
sewers cause
flooding
Med
Med
WW2:
Overloaded
sewers cause
pollution
Med
Med
E3: Greenhouse
gas emissions
N/A
High
B1 Inability to
secure approval
Med
Med
Medium risk
2050s
2020: After our next
round of risk mitigation
2012
High risk
2030s
)
Low risk
Outcomes being supported
We provide you with water that is clean and safe to drink
We make sure that you always have enough water
We take care of your waste water and protect you and the environment from sewer flooding
We provide the level of customer service you expect and value
Progress measure for this theme of action
Measure:
Current performance:
Future target:
Water efficiency (litres per household)
Reducing average household use by 1 litre per day each year
Continue to reduce average household use by 1 litre per day each year
22 | Part A: Communication and collaboration
Learning
about
the water
treatment
process
We believe everyone has a role to play in managing water
for the future, and many of our customers and stakeholders
agree. People’s behaviours can help or hinder our response
to climate change so this is an important part of our strategy,
for example:
• The amount of water customers use directly affects the
scale of our operations and the environmental impact
we have, as does our own water use for things like
cleaning pipes.
Providing free
and easy ways
for customers
to save water
Our plans to inform and encourage more sustainable consumer
behaviours include:
• Sharing information through targeted campaigns using
a variety of traditional and social media.
• Providing key messages in customer contact information
such as bills, letters and on our website.
• Talking directly with interested customers and stakeholders
at community groups and regional events.
• Items such as fats, oils, wipes and nappies can reduce
sewer capacity and contribute to flooding and pollution.
• Reporting our performance against targets on key issues
like leakage and partnership working.
• Land management practices can result in water pollution
through soil erosion and use of pesticides.
• Researching customer behaviours and the effectiveness
of our campaigns. For example, we are installing water
meters on virtually every property in one community so
that we can develop a much more detailed understanding
of water-use patterns.
Many things can be done by working in partnership to
minimise these issues and thereby reduce the scale of our
climate change challenge. These will also achieve many other
benefits. For example, we can use less water, find more
effective disposal routes for problem wastes and manage
land in ways that prevent erosion and chemical run-off.
We have experience in many of these areas, including awardwinning campaigns such as ‘Doing the Dirty’, and industryleading engagement and partnerships with landowners. We
use data and research to help focus engagement resources
on hot spot locations. We also tailor the media type to target
socio-economic groups. For example, we increase our sewer
behaviour advertising in areas showing the most sewer
blockages caused by fats, oils and grease, or we might focus
on social media to target a younger audience.
We have found that an effective approach requires long-term
messaging delivered through a variety of media. Our goal is to
encourage our customers to think about the services they so
often use without a second thought. In doing so our customers
are helping us to meet the ultimate service outcomes they
expect of us. We plan to make the most of every customer
contact, whether in the media, while visiting our recreational
sites or liaising directly with our staff. Our future plans will
continue with our tried and tested techniques such as leaflets,
information boards, education centres and advertising
campaigns. We will also further our use of social media and
consider innovative approaches to engagement campaigns.
• Using our legal powers where necessary to hold people
and businesses to account and set clear expectations,
for example in trade effluent licencing.
More information on our latest engagement campaigns can be
found at yorkshirewater.com .
Customer voice
“I believe we are all accountable
and together we can make
a difference.”
“We all have a responsibility
not to waste water. Customers
should not waste water by...
leaving taps running, making
sure dishwashers and washing
machines have full loads, taking
showers instead of baths.”
Domestic customers, 201219
23 | Part A: Communication and collaboration
A3: Supporting effective legislation and regulation
Section summary
• Effective national policy is essential to the success
of our climate change strategy because we are
supported and bound by a wide range of legislation
and regulation that shapes the nature and pace of
our approach to climate change.
• We will continue to support policy makers with
our knowledge and evidence to help shape effective
legislation and regulation.
• We have identified a number of opportunities where
enhanced legislation and regulation would support
a more effective response to climate change.
Main climate change risks being addressed (full details in Appendix 1
2013: As we stand today
Risk title
Trend
2013
2080s
2020
2030s
2050s
2080s
Risk
understanding
2013
WQ1: Land
management
Low
Med
WW1:
Overloaded
sewers cause
flooding
Med
Med
E3: Greenhouse
gas emissions
N/A
High
CS1: Flooding of
our assets
Med
Med
CS12: Resilient
supply chain,
including grid
electricity
Low
Low
CS13: Resilient
self-generated
energy
Low
Low
B1: Inability to
secure approval
Med
Med
Medium risk
2050s
2020: After our next
round of risk mitigation
2012
High risk
2030s
)
Low risk
Outcomes being supported
We provide you with water that is clean and safe to drink
We make sure that you always have enough water
We take care of your waste water and protect you and the environment from sewer flooding
We understand our impact on the wider environment and act responsibly
We provide the level of customer service you expect and value
Progress measure for this theme of action
Measure:
Current performance:
Future target:
Proportion of relevant consultation responses
Responding to all relevant consultations
Continuing to respond to all relevant consultations
24 | Part A: Communication and collaboration
Discussing catchment management
with policy makers like the then
Minister for Water, Richard Benyon
The UK water and waste water industry is closely regulated.
The industry has to comply with, and can make use of, a wide
range of legislation and regulation that shapes the nature of
our approach to climate change by:
• Setting minimum standards for customer service, water and
waste water quality, as well as many other aspects of our
activities. These standards set minimum levels of resilience.
• Providing legal duties and powers so that we and others
can protect our customers’ wellbeing, the environment
and essential infrastructure. For example, by playing our
part in local and regional planning.
• Offering incentives for priority activities, such as
greenhouse gas emissions reduction, energy generation
and water resource management.
Water industry legislation and regulation continues to evolve
to meet the changing needs of society. Our successful adaptation
and mitigation will require effective legislation and regulation.
We have a long history of supporting policy makers by providing
evidence, expertise and knowledge. We will continue to support
them, both through direct engagement and indirectly through
our industry body, Water UK.
We believe there are opportunities to support a more
effective approach to climate change through enhanced
legislation and regulation:
National debate on customers’ ability and willingness
to pay to ensure future levels of service beyond 2020. We
think there is a need for the government, Ofwat and the
water companies to work together to lead a mature national
debate about how we most effectively fund the long-term
customer expectations of the water and waste water industry.
Regulating minimum weather resilience standards
for infrastructure and services would secure the protection
of today’s essential services and lay strong foundations for
the future, both in water and other interdependent sectors.
For example, legislating for the 1:200 rainfall event and
other standards outlined in the Cabinet Office guide
Keeping the Country Running (20115).
25 | Part A: Communication and collaboration
Managed flexibility in environmental water quality
standards would support more sustainable approaches that
better balance the needs of the aquatic and atmospheric
environments. Modern technology might enable effluent
discharges to be managed in real-time according to the state
of the receiving environment. Treating to higher standards in
low flows and/or more relaxed standards in high flows can
enable treatment optimisation to save energy and chemicals
while assuring overall water quality and supporting customer
affordability. We have been developing an innovative approach
in partnership with the Environment Agency and others.
We call this rtRIVERi. We would welcome the opportunity to
discuss our research and the practicalities of implementation.
Stronger incentives for resilient, low-carbon energy
generation would enable us to play a greater role in using
our infrastructure and resources for the maximum benefit
of society. For example, statutory industry targets and/
or increased financial support would enable us to deliver
a wide range of renewable generation schemes which we
have assessed as feasible and cost-effective. While these
schemes will reduce bills in the long-term, our customers find
themselves unable to support the necessary upfront capital
investment in the current economic climate.
Stronger and clearer long-term carbon pricing would
support the pace and scope of our carbon-reduction activities
by informing our cost-benefit assessments. For example, the
existing incentives of the Carbon Reduction Commitment
Energy Efficiency Scheme (CRC) and Climate Change Levy (CCL)
could be merged into one stronger price signal with long-term
price setting published by the government. There is also an
opportunity to reduce the current administrative burden of
the CRC, even in its simplified form, by collecting tax revenue
through energy bills, as is the case with CCL currently.
Peat moorland restoration can be enhanced through
enforcement of existing legislation and stronger incentives.
We support the Adaptation Sub-Committee’s three
recommendations to the government in their recent annual
progress report: “(i) set an explicit policy goal to increase the
area under restoration, (ii) review the enforcement of current
regulations, and (iii) improve incentives for landowners to
invest in restoration” (Adaptation Sub-Committee, 20134).
A newly installed energy
efficient pump
Using technology
to allow remote,
efficient working
A4: Empowering our people and partners
Section summary
• Everyone who works with us has a role to play in our
response to climate change. We are empowering every
employee to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions
and prepare for the changing climate.
• We are embedding the necessary culture through a
number of activities, including our ‘CO2llaborate to
use less’ campaign and through revision to our policies
and procedures.
Main climate change risks being addressed (full details in Appendix 1
2013: As we stand today
Risk title
Trend
2013
2080s
2020
2030s
2050s
2080s
Risk
understanding
2013
E3: Greenhouse
gas emissions
N/A
High
B2: Affordability
Low
Low
Medium risk
2050s
2020: After our next
round of risk mitigation
2012
High risk
2030s
)
Low risk
Outcomes being supported
We understand our impact on the wider environment and act responsibly
We provide the level of customer service you expect and value
We keep your bills as low as possible
Progress measure for this theme of action
Measure:
Current performance:
Future target:
Number of colleagues ‘Co2llaborate’ trained.
Over 900 have received high level training and 100 have had detailed training.
3,400 to receive high level training by April 2014 and 600 to receive detailed
training by April 2015.
26 | Part A: Communication and collaboration
A colleague stands proudly
with an innovative energy
generation research trial
Everyone who works for us has a role to play in our response
to climate change. We made a commitment in our July 2012
climate change position paper to “drive initiatives to empower
every employee to reduce carbon emissions and prepare for
the changing climate”. We are doing this by embedding the
necessary culture across our business through a range of
activities. Changing culture is not a quick or easy task so we
plan for a long-term evolutionary approach. We provide below
some examples of current and planned work in this area.
At the heart of our approach to cultural change is our
‘CO2llaborate to use less’ campaign. This is a bespoke
programme to encourage sustainable thinking in everything
we do. We started this campaign in 2012 knowing that it
would evolve over time. To date, we have focused on the
priority areas of energy consumption and GHG emissions.
The campaign started by raising awareness and engaging
our people on the nature and scale of our energy and carbon
challenge. We are now in the second phase which involves
company-wide training. This is delivering an environmental
awareness e-learning course to all employees, as well as a
package of more detailed modules for approximately 600
specialist staff who are in those roles that have highest impact
on our energy and emissions. Our CO2llaborate programme
is generating ideas, building advocacy and delivering energy
management improvement.
In addition to our engagement campaign, we are also
ensuring effective governance processes to support the
development and delivery of our climate change strategy.
27 | Part A: Communication and collaboration
to use less
This has included a variety of activities and plans to date,
including establishing a cross-business climate change
co-ordination and strategy group in 2011 and integrating
climate change into our corporate risk management and
reporting systems.
We will continue to evolve our training and engagement
activities and we plan to extend it to our delivery and supply
partners. We will also continue to embed climate change
into our policies, procedures and design standards to ensure
it is considered ‘business as usual’.
Part B:
Adaptation
Preparing for climate change
and enhancing resilience
to extreme weather
Stakeholder voice
“Our research shows that
consumers continue to place
the highest importance on
delivering safe and reliable
water and sewerage services.
So, their resilience remains
a key priority, particularly as
the issue is likely to become
an even greater concern in
the future.”
Ofwat, 201025
We’re working with farmers
to adapt land management
practices to protect water quality
and the natural environment
Introduction
Our customers, regulators and stakeholders have made it
clear that it is a top priority to maintain and enhance water
and waste water services. Climate change threatens our
ability to meet expectations. We recognise the magnitude of
the potential challenge, having reviewed the best available
evidence and assessed the risks. Many of our climate change
risks are already being managed at the local level and we
expect these to grow over time if we do not act. Over the
following pages we describe our plans to ensure the
long-term weather and climate resilience of our services.
B1: Maintaining excellent drinking water quality is at risk
from existing and changing land management practices. We
have a twin-track response to today’s immediate problems and
the long-term trend.
B2: Ensuring sufficient water supplies will be challenged by
an increasing deficit in our supply and demand balance, caused
primarily by the changing climate. Our 25 year Water Resource
Management Plan includes a broad range of measures that can
be implemented over time to fill the gap.
29 | Part B: Adaptation
B3: Protecting people and the environment from
sewer flooding is a critical service that is under threat
from more frequent extreme rainfall. We are working to
include the long-term risks in our drainage area models
and ensure sustainable drainage management through a
portfolio of traditional and new approaches like modular
design and Sustainable Drainage Solutions (SuDS).
B4: Improving the environment by enhancing our waste
water treatment processes and working in partnership to
protect the land and aquatic environment. Maximising
the health of habitats and species will help them resist the
changing climate to the best of their ability.
B5: Enhancing the resilience of our critical assets and
services to extreme weather and coastal erosion. We have
assessed the risks and identified a range of actions we need
to take. We will be addressing an immediate risk from coastal
erosion to a number of our assets.
B6: Keeping bills affordable is and will continue to be a
challenge if we are to respond effectively to climate change.
In line with our customers’ expectations, we have prioritised
the most essential activities in our plans to 2020 to ensure
bills do not rise above inflation.
B1: Maintaining excellent drinking water quality
Section summary
• We have a twin-track approach that is protecting
customers’ drinking water:
• Climate change presents strategic risks to our ability
to provide clean and safe drinking water. The priority
risk is from land use practices that result in pollution
from pesticides or make peat vulnerable to erosion
which causes discolouration of water. This is already
a problem today and is expected to worsen in the
changing climate if we do not act.
– Catchment management provides the long-term solution
by working in partnership to tackle problems at source.
– Our drinking water quality programme ensures today’s
supplies are clean and safe by enhancing treatment
works and operational and maintenance activities.
• We will continue to further our knowledge through
monitoring and research, to inform our future approach.
Main climate change risks being addressed (full details in Appendix 1
2013: As we stand today
Risk title
Trend
2013
2080s
2020
2030s
2050s
2080s
Risk
understanding
2013
WQ1: Land
management
Low
Med
WQ2: Rainfall
impacts raw
water quality
Low
Med
WQ3: Salinisation
of water resources
Low
Low
WQ4: Water
borne diseases
Low
Low
WR4: Reservoir
siltation
Low
Med
WE1: Biodiversity
Low
Med
B2: Affordability
Low
Low
Medium risk
2050s
2020: After our next
round of risk mitigation
2012
High risk
2030s
)
Low risk
Outcomes being supported
We provide you with water that is clean and safe to drink
We protect and improve the water environment
We keep your bills as low as possible
Progress measure for this theme of action
Measure:
Current performance:
Future target:
30 | Part B: Adaptation
Long-term stability and reliability factor: Treated water quality
Stable (2014/15)
Stable (2019/20)
We’re investing to treat
deteriorating raw water
quality like these high
colour levels caused by
peat erosion in Nidderdale
Customer voice
“I don’t think water is negotiable.
It has got to be clean, healthy
and there when you want it.”
Domestic customer from Hull, 2013
26
Climate change presents a number of risks to our ability to
deliver clean, and safe drinking water. As can be seen from
the risk scores, the priority risk in this group is from land
management practices causing pollution of the water we
abstract from the environment for treatment and supply.
This is a complex area with multiple factors affecting land and
how it is managed. This includes for example: reform of subsidies
made under the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), global
markets, pests and diseases, traditions and new technologies.
Over the past two decades, raw water quality has deteriorated
in many of our catchments. The more polluted raw water is,
the more we need to treat it to make it fit for drinking. Extra
treatment has financial, energy and emissions implications.
This risk is a climate adaptation concern for two main reasons:
• Over-grazing, drainage, burning and other practices
can leave bare peat and soil susceptible to erosion and
therefore vulnerable to extreme weather. These practices
also introduce air into the peat, allowing bacteria to
break it down to form colour in water. Colour is removed
through intense treatment processes to make it suitable
for human supply. Healthy, vegetated peats and soils are
more resilient to erosion, helping avoid water colour.
• The use of fertilisers and pesticides is likely to change as
farming practices respond to climate change and other
factors. For example, the amount of land being sown for
Winter Oil Seed Rape has increased over recent years. This
explains to some degree why we are seeing elevated levels of
metaldehyde in the raw waters during Autumn because Oil
Seed Rape farming uses metaldehyde pellets for slug control.
We ensure our customers receive high quality drinking water
despite deteriorating raw water quality through our twin-track
approach. Catchment management is our primary long-term
response, recognising that the issue needs to be addressed at
source. Catchment management can take 10 to 15 years for
the activities to have a benefit. In the short-term, we also need
to enhance Water Treatment Works (WTW) capability, because
the probability of failure presents an unacceptable risk to our
customers. This twin-track approach is appropriate when
considering future climate change because it balances the
immediate need for absolute certainty in the quality of drinking
water with the long-term goal for a flexible, low-carbon,
sustainable solution. Below, we look at recent performance
and future plans for the two elements of our twin track
approach. We also describe our plans for future research to
continue developing our knowledge.
In our Drinking Water Safety Plans we observe
significant risks to our customers that can be
influenced by the weather and climate, from:
• Disinfection by-products
(particularly trihalomethanes)
• Cryptosporidium
• Pesticides (particularly metaldehyde)
• Other substances and organisms.
The climate mitigation aspects to land management are
covered in section C4 and the biodiversity aspects are
covered in section B4 .
31 | Part B: Adaptation
B1.1 Investing in catchment
management to protect
water quality
We have been addressing the root causes of poor water
quality for over ten years in order to provide an alternative to
costly investment in extra water treatment capabilities. We
have done this by investing in extensive monitoring, research
and innovative land maintenance and restoration techniques.
Through multi-agency partnerships we have delivered a
range of industry-leading activities, including for example:
• Working with our land tenants and Natural England on
Keighley Moor to deliver catchment restoration in practice.
This has formed the basis of an Ecosystem Services
valuation, published by Natural England.
• Working with, and funding, Moors for the Future to
improve 114 km2 of blanket bog owned by us and
10 km2 of land owned by the National Trust.
• Working with and funding the Yorkshire Peat Partnership to
restore 10 km2 of peat moorlands in the Upper Nidderdale.
• Working with national experts such as Durham and Leeds
Universities on an extensive programme of research.
We have evidenced how the management of moorland
catchments can positively or negatively impact peat erosion
and the subsequent colour-related issues this causes in
water, as well as wider opportunities and risks such as to
biodiversity, recreation, greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions.
We plan to focus in the following areas up to 2020:
• Embsay moor.
• The moors above Roundhill and Leighton reservoirs.
• North Yorkshire moors.
• Coverdale, Wensleydale and other areas, working
with the Yorkshire Peat Partnership.
• Hallam and Derwent moors, working with Severn
Trent Water.
We will seek to work in partnership in the Wiske subcatchment, a tributary of the River Ouse that supplies York.
We will look to identify the sources of excess metaldehyde
and high levels of phosphate by developing an integrated land
management plan. The plan will also explore land management
options to reduce the pollutants while ensuring the landowner
is not financially compromised. For example, the introduction
of woodland or other buffer strips or other innovative solutions.
We will also investigate a Payment for Ecosystem Services (PES)
approach that could involve paying farmers to use better
quality metaldehyde pellets or more sustainable alternatives.
Our approach will replicate and expand on recent work that
has demonstrated the amount of land brought into agricultural
production has increased over the last 12 years, and the
amount of land being sown for Winter Oil Seed Rape has also
significantly increased. This explains to some degree why we
are seeing elevated levels of metaldehyde in the raw waters
during Autumn because this farming practice typically uses
metaldehyde pellets.
Peat moorlands are particularly important in our region
because they are the source catchments for a large proportion
of our drinking water. Our research with Leeds University
(201227) concluded that the climate will not be suitable for
peat moorlands within Yorkshire by 2050 under the 2009
UK climate projections ‘high emissions scenario’, and by
2080 under the ‘low emissions scenario’. That does not
mean that the peat moorlands in the region will disappear,
it indicates they may become more prone to erosion and
have the potential to cause large water quality problems in
the future. The review found that management interventions
can be effective but are likely to take a number of years for
the benefits to be manifested. Rewetting the peat, holding
back sediment and encouraging moss-forming Sphagnumrich surfaces will, in the long-term, add resilience to the peat
system, reducing and delaying problems caused by climate
change. It is also highly likely that wet, Sphagnum-rich
peat moorlands will be more resilient to wildfire than peats
dominated by shrubby vegetation and lower water tables.
We also outline below a number of planned investigations
that will help us develop knowledge to inform our future
catchment approaches.
Our catchment management programme covers a range
of water quality parameters including colour, pesticides,
nitrates and saline intrusion on reservoir, river and borehole
sources. We are focusing our future moorland restoration
activity on catchments where colour pollution is likely to
overwhelm WTW capacity in the longer term. Our programme
covers both implementation and investigations. Our activities
will be delivered in partnership with a range of charities,
landowners, regulatory agencies and other stakeholders where
this is mutually beneficial. In addition to protection of water
quality, our moorland management schemes will also deliver
a wide range of other benefits to our customers and wider
society, including climate change mitigation, climate adaptation
and biodiversity.
Working in partnership with landowners to investigate
the sources of nitrate in groundwater through monitoring,
sampling and analysis. The project will consider the age and
residence time of the nitrate in groundwater to help inform
effective response plans. We will focus on groundwater that is
abstracted from one representative source in the Chalk aquifer
and one in the Sherwood Sandstone.
32 | Part B: Adaptation
B1.2 Developing our knowledge
Nitrate and other pollutants present risks to a number of our
groundwater sources. In the past, we have applied treatment
solutions to ensure water quality requirements. In-line with our
catchment based approach, we need to understand the source
of these problems to determine the sustainable long-term
response. With only limited information on this topic, the first
step is to understand the problem to allow implementation of
effective and targeted solutions. We will carry out a range of
land management research and investigations to help inform
our future approach to groundwater protection. Projects we
are planning include, for example:
Identifying sources of nitrate pollution in groundwater
Our water treatment
works at Loftsome Bridge
The impact of climate change on crop growth
and associated use of fertiliser/pesticide
Investigating and modelling the likely changes in cropping
and how we as a water supplier might influence this to
prevent adverse effects on groundwater from use of
fertilisers and pesticides; or if appropriate, surface water.
Hydrogeological investigation into sources of
water to inform future land management
Building on existing work to improve understanding of how
rainfall travels into the groundwater and ultimately reaches
our water sources. This is likely to include tracer studies, source
protection zone delineation and detailed geological mapping.
The iconic Yorkshire landscape
The sites are shown in the table below.
Scheme name
Driver
Rivelin WTW
Colour, disinfection
by-products, Cryptosporidium
Langsett WTW
Colour, disinfection by-products
Irton borehole
Cryptosporidium, disinfection
by-products, pesticides
Cowick borehole
Other substances and
organisms (bacteria)
Heck borehole
Other substances and
organisms (bacteria)
Lead (regional scheme)
Lead
Saline intrusion in Hull
We will investigate the saline front in the Chalk aquifer
under Hull to inform our risk understanding and response
needs. The Chalk groundwater body has been assessed as
‘poor’ status under the Water Framework Directive (WFD)
and is a problem for industrial and public water supply
abstractions. Our source is outside the affected area but
there is a risk the saline front could move inland if large
abstraction is needed to maintain supplies during a drought.
If our borehole supply becomes contaminated, we could lose
this water source. Sampling over time will determine the
dynamics of the saline intrusion and help to quantify the risk.
B1.3 Investing in drinking water
treatment to protect water quality
We increase treatment capabilities where we have identified
a risk to customers from deteriorating raw water quality.
We also maintain existing infrastructure and operations.
The quality of water we have delivered to our customers
has been of a very high standard, with over 99.9% of
thousands of samples meeting tight regulatory standards
each year. To maintain this high level of performance, we
have identified several unacceptable risks which require a
treatment solution in the period 2015-2020.
Our long-standing programme of capital investment will
continue with a further £49m of investment between
2015-2020. This will include action on six large schemes
to mitigate the risk of drinking water quality failures and
improve the acceptability of water to consumers.
33 | Part B: Adaptation
B1.4 Our long-term plans
Over the next 25 years we plan to invest £2.8 billion to ensure we
can continue to deliver water that meets the stringent standards
set by government. The investment will be targeted at:
• Addressing deteriorating raw water quality from moors,
rivers and groundwater.
• Driving down complaints associated with discolouration
and taste.
• Managing and maintaining our WTWs and water network
to secure and improve compliance with quality standards.
We are planning to increase our maintenance activity by 45%
between 2020-2030 to maintain the long-term reliability and
sustainability of assets and services, with a focus on ensuring
compliance with water quality standards.
We will continue to develop how we integrate the impacts
of climate change in our planning. We will review and update
our plans at regular intervals to ensure that we always act on
the latest available data.
Further information
More details can be found on our website
blueprintforyorkshire.com
B2: Ensuring sufficient water supplies
Section summary
• Our 25 year Water Resources Management Plan (WRMP)
finds that climate change will have a critical influence
on our long-term water resources. The plan describes
how we have a broad range of options to manage the
balance between water supply and demand through
the changing climate and other pressures. In the shortterm we will reduce demand for water through further
investment to control leakage, and by working with
customers to use less. We have many long-term options
and will review our needs every five years.
• The capacity and resilience of our water treatment and
supply infrastructure is critical to our ability to maintain
water services through periods of peak demand in
extreme dry or cold weather. We have assessed the
investment and operational actions we will need to take
to maintain and enhance this infrastructure.
• We have detailed plans and facilities in place to manage
extreme events that challenge our water supply service.
This is our most mature area of current resilience and
future planning.
Main climate change risks being addressed (full details in Appendix 1
2013: As we stand today
Risk title
Trend
2013
2080s
2020
2030s
2050s
2080s
Risk
understanding
2013
WR1: Demand
exceeds supply
Med
High
WR2: Demand
exceeds
distribution
Low
Med
WR3: Cold causes
bursts
Low
Med
WR4: Reservoir
siltation
Low
Med
WR5: National
emergency water
transfer
Low
Low
B2: Affordability
Low
Low
Medium risk
2050s
2020: After our next
round of risk mitigation
2012
High risk
2030s
)
Low risk
Outcomes being supported
We make sure that you always have enough water
We protect and improve the water environment
Progress measure for this theme of action
Measure:
Current performance:
Future target:
34 | Part B: Adaptation
Long-term stability and reliability factor: Water network
Stable (2014/15)
Stable (2019/20)
Our customers place a high value on the reliability of their water
supply. Climate change threatens our ability to maintain this
service by challenging the balance between water demand
and supply. Climate change means we are likely to experience
more dry spells and warmer temperatures, which reduces the
amount of water available, just as water demand for gardens
and showers increases. We also expect to see changes in rainfall
patterns, with more rain falling in winter, and less in summer.
These changes mean we will need to catch more water when
it is available and be more careful about how we use it. This is
arguably the most critical part of our climate change strategy
because of the importance of our drinking water service.
We are well placed to manage the balance between water
supply and demand through the changing climate. This is our
most mature area of current resilience and future planning.
Our region has a good range and balance of water supply
options with reservoirs in the west, river abstractions in the
north and groundwaters in the east. We have maximised the
benefit of this mix of water sources by developing infrastructure
that allows us to move water around the region to where it is
needed. We call this the Yorkshire grid and it covers 99% of
our customers. We manage our grid to offer one of the most
resilient water supply systems in the country. The grid is shown
in the diagram below.
35 | Part B: Adaptation
Customer voice
When ranking our service
priorities, top of the list for
customers was a ‘Continuous
supply of clean, safe water
for drinking and washing/
business use’.
Our research, 201328
The process of planning and managing Yorkshire’s water
supply involves a fully integrated approach from source to
tap across the whole region. We have a proven track record
of success, with no service restrictions, like hosepipe bans,
for over 15 years. This is largely because of the advances we
have made following the 1995/96 drought. We have been so
successful that today our customers tell us they rarely think
about their water service, and only then, in the rare event that
something goes wrong. We can be proud of this performance
but we are far from complacent. We continue to maintain
and enhance the security of our water supply service by:
A detailed assessment of climate change is included
alongside other future factors such as population growth,
housing, water use, leakage and metering trends.
The plan is a statutory requirement overseen by Defra and
the Environment Agency (EA), produced in accordance with
the risk-based approach described in their guideline.
At the time of publishing this climate change strategy,
we are finalising our latest WRMP, covering the period
2015/16-2039/40. We have recently published our ‘revised
draft WRMP’ and refer below to this latest position. Figures
are unlikely to change significantly between this and our
final WRMP which will be published in 2014. The water
resources pages on our website are kept up to date with
the latest available WRMP documentation, which details the
full methodology, findings and response plans. This can be
found at yorkshirewater.com/our-environment/waterresources/managing-water-resources.aspx .
• Long-term planning to sustainably maintain the balance
between supply and demand despite pressures like
climate change and population growth section B2.1 .
• Reducing water demand through a continuous focus
on leakage, and working with customers to use less
section B2.2 .
• Maintaining and enhancing our water treatment and
supply infrastructure to get drinking water to where it
is needed – section B2.3 . This also ensures water
quality as we describe in section B1 .
The impacts of climate change have been included in our
water resources planning since the 1990s. We have continually
advanced our approach and always use the latest available
climate projections to determine the impact on water demand
and water resources. We have used the 2009 UK Climate
Projections (UKCP09) and our own research to inform our latest
WRMP. Our assessments show that climate change is likely to
have a significant impact on our long-term water resources but
minimal impact on customer demand.
• Emergency planning to maintain supplies during extreme
weather or other emergencies section B2.4 .
B2.1 Long-term planning to
sustainably maintain the balance
between supply and demand
We worked with national experts at HR Wallingford to
assess the impact of climate change on our water resources. We
identified indicators of drought and selected ten scenarios that
span the range of modelled projections in UKCP09 and ten more
from only the drier range, thereby stress testing our capability.
We modelled the impact of these scenarios using our Water
Resources Allocation Planning Simulation (WRAPsim) model. The
impact of these scenarios on the volume of water we can supply,
known as deployable output, is shown in the graph below.
Our detailed WRMP describes how we will maintain the
balance between water supply and demand over the next
25 years. Our WRMP describes the action we will take to
maintain set levels of service for customers, while meeting
the needs of the environment, all at the best financial cost.
The impact of climate change scenarios on our water resources
UKCP09
Model ID
1500
1400
1068
Deployable Output MI/d
9393
1628
1300
1
9051
1200
5852
1232
1972
1100
10th Percentile 2619
7518
7719
1000
4882
3684
5787
900
median 3667
9784
800
5669
2010
2015
2020
2025
2030
Year
2035
2040
2045
2734
90th percentile 3160
7772
36 | Part B: Adaptation
Stakeholder voice
Customer voice
“The challenge of climate
change puts even greater
importance on water
resource planning.”
65% of those customers
asked ranked leakage
reduction as their first or
second preference for
maintaining the supply/
demand balance. 31%
ranked water meters as
a first or second option,
despite it being relatively
more expensive compared
to other options shown.
Defra, 201314
We can see that the effects of climate change on deployable
output are uncertain, and these uncertainties are considered
in the WRMP. Full details of this climate change assessment
can be found in our document: ‘Technical submission: Climate
change effect on deployable output assessment’. This is
available on request.
Our climate change assessment on water demand forecasts
a less than 1% increase for garden use and personal washing,
and no overall impact on total industrial demand. Water
efficiency is integral to our WRMP and we discuss our strategy
for this below. We will continue to promote water efficiency
each year throughout the 25 year planning period, and have
included a reduction in demand of 2 Ml/d (mega litres per day)
into our forecasts. We note that agricultural needs for water
may increase sharply (Adaptation Sub-Committee, 20134),
however we currently supply little water for agricultural and
horticultural purposes.
Our research, 201216
We would welcome engagement with the agricultural sector
to discuss how we may support this industry further in the
future. We have highlighted this area for further consideration
in our research and investigation programme.
Overall, we find a growing deficit in our supply demand
balance in the water resource zone that covers 99% of our
region. We call this the Grid Surface Water Zone. Climate
change is the dominant cause of a continuing decline in
water available for supply. This is shown in the graph below.
The balance between water supply and demand
1400
1380
1360
Demand + headroom
1340
Deficit below
headroom from
2018/19
MI/d
1320
1300
Demand
1280
Deficit below demand
from 2028/29
1260
Water available decreasing due
to climate change
1240
Total water
available
for supply
1220
1200
9
5
3
7
0
6
4
9
3
1
5
4
0
7
6
1
8
0
2
2
8
9
5
6
7
3
4
8
2
/3
/3
/2
/3
/3
/2
/3
/2
/2
/4
/3
/2
/2
/3
/3
/2
/1
/1
/1
/1
/2
/1
/3
/3
/1
/2
/2
/1
/1
11 012 013 014 015 016 017 018 019 020 021 022 023 024 025 026 027 028 029 030 031 032 033 034 035 036 037 038 039
20
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
37 | Part B: Adaptation
We also export a small amount of treated water to Anglian
Water to support their needs. Our assessment and discussions
with neighbouring water companies concluded that further
water trading options are not currently cost-effective or
environmentally acceptable. Our modelling showed that we
need to plan for less water from the Derwent Valley supply by
Severn Trent Water because of climate change.
We can choose from a broad range of options to address
the growing deficit. To determine the optimal approach
we have assessed all realistic options for their financial,
social and environmental impact, including greenhouse
gas emissions. We have also assessed customer support.
Customers, government and regulators tell us they prefer
demand reduction measures such as leakage control and
metering, before supply measures such as new abstractions.
In the short-term, to 2020, our options appraisal found that
further leakage reduction would be the most cost- and
environmentally-effective option. We will also continue
to enhance customer water efficiency through increased
metering and use of water saving devices and audits.
We discuss this in more detail below.
B2.2 Reducing water demand
Water efficiency is an integral part of water resource planning.
A priority for water saving is to sustainably reduce leakage,
both from customers’ pipes inside their property boundary, and
our own supply pipes. Another priority is to work in partnership
with our customers to help them use less.
In the longer term we expect to need to implement supply
as well as demand options, for example, increasing the
capacity of some existing borehole abstractions and installing
a pipeline to deliver abstracted river water to one of our
Water Treatment Works (WTW). In practice, plans beyond
2020 remain highly flexible. The WRMP is updated every five
years and this will allow us to re-evaluate the climate change
risk. The cyclical approach to water resources management
planning ensures that we take action with confidence and
using the latest available information. A flexible, progressive
approach is appropriate because knowledge evolves rapidly
on climate change and other future factors.
Reducing leakage
Since 1995 we have almost halved leakage. We have reduced
leakage to our lowest ever recorded levels in recent years,
achieving 264.72 Ml/d in 2012/13 against a target of 297.1 Ml/d.
We recognise there is more to do.
The majority of leaks are from our distribution mains and a
third is from customers’ supply pipes, for which they are legally
responsible. We can reduce leakage from our mains and
activities by increasing the number of people who find and fix
leaks, by managing the pressure in the network and by relining
or replacing pipes. We also invest in research and innovation.
The chart below shows the latest view on the combination
of options we expect to implement over time to most
effectively meet the growing deficit. This is subject to the
final WRMP in 2014.
Annual leakage targets for the next 25 years are modelled
for our WRMP, using methodologies provided by Defra, the
EA and Ofwat. We plan to reduce our leakage target by a
further 10 million litres a day, from 297.1 Ml/d to 287.1 Ml/d
by 2020. We will strive to continue beating our target by
focusing our operational resources and further innovation.
Another supply option is to trade water between companies.
We have traded water with our neighbouring water companies
for many years and consider such options as standard part
of our planning. We have a notable import agreement with
Severn Trent Water to use water from the Derwent Valley to
support demand in the Sheffield area.
Our optimised plan to maintain the water supply demand balance
P1e Reduction in WTW process losses Option 5
120
R8b Vale of York Phase 2
D2e Pressure management 1.2 Ml/d
100
R12 East Yorkshire Groundwater Option 1
C1a (i) Business customer audits and
retrofit one off implementation
80
D20 Ouse Raw Water Transfer
P1c Reduction in WTW process losses Option 3
D2c Pressure management 1.6 Ml/d
D2b Pressure management 1.8 Ml/d
60
Ml/d
D2d Pressure management 1.4 Ml/d
40
D2a Pressure management 2.2 Ml/d
D1g Active Leakage Control in DMAs 30-35 Ml/d
R9 North Yorkshire Groundwater
20
D1f Active Leakage Control in DMAs 25-30 Ml/d
D1e Active Leakage Control in DMAs 20-25 Ml/d
0
D1d Active Leakage Control in DMAs 15-20 Ml/d
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25
D1c Active Leakage Control in DMAs 10-15 Ml/d
-20
D1b Active Leakage Control in DMAs 5-10 Ml/d
D1a Active Leakage Control in DMAs 0-5 Ml/d
SDB – the gap between supply and demand (Ml/d)
38 | Part B: Adaptation
Year
Customer voice
82% said it would be
unacceptable for their water
company to allow more
interruptions to supply.
Our research, 201219
Installing a
water efficient
shower head
We offer our customers a free repair service for all domestic
supply pipes which are not under buildings. We also offer
assistance for detection and repair of any commercial supply
pipe leaks. In addition, we raise awareness with customers
that they are legally responsible for the supply pipes in their
property boundary. We also offer advice and support to help
customers understand how they can manage their supply pipes.
Working with customers to use less
Our goal is to deliver tangible water efficiencies and sustainable
behavioural change, with a target to reduce water use by
2.1 Ml/d each year. This is equivalent to one litre per household
per day each year. We have achieved this target since 2010
and are committed to continuing to do so into the future. We
summarise below the range of water saving initiatives we offer
our domestic and business customers. This is in addition to the
leakage service we described above:
• Free water meters are provided to household customers
on request. Meters provide a financial incentive to use less
water. Our WRMP forecasts a doubling of households with
meters over the next 25 years, from 48% in 2015, to 80%
by 2039/40. Metering is instinctively an appropriate method
of charging for water supply and sewerage services, based
on payment for use. However, metering can result in a more
expensive bill because of the additional cost of installing
and maintaining the meter.
• Free water saving devices like tap aerators and
shower timers are provided to households, businesses
and community groups. We also promote water butts
and sell them at discounted prices on our website.
• Advice and information is provided through
communication campaigns, at events, in our written
communications and on our website. We also run
education centres for schools and provide information
packs for teachers and their pupils.
• Water audits are provided at non-household
premises and we install appropriate devices to reduce
water consumption.
• Water usage investigations are carried out by our
customer service and conservation teams.
More information can be found on the dedicated water
efficiency section of our website yorkshirewater.com/
save-water-and-money.aspx .
39 | Part B: Adaptation
B2.3 Maintaining and enhancing
resilient water treatment and
supply infrastructure
To treat and supply drinking water we manage over
50 WTWs and a distribution network of over 31,000 km
of water mains with associated valves, pump and meters.
The capacity and resilience of this infrastructure is critical
to our ability to maintain water services through periods
of peak demand in extremely dry or cold weather.
A resilient water network
Climate change and extreme weather impact our network
in a number of ways. Cold weather can cause cast iron pipes
to become brittle and susceptible to burst, particularly if there
are prolonged periods of temperatures below 4˚C. High river
flows, intense rainfall events and floods can damage pipes by
causing road or bridge crossings to be eroded, or by causing
land slips, exposing the pipework. Dry spells can cause soil to
shrink and move, affecting pipe integrity. All of these issues
can result in an interruption to customers’ water supply. The
flexibility provided by our grid offers resilience against these
risks because we can often maintain water supplies via an
alternative route.
We will continue the large and critical task of maintaining our
network. This will be essential to our climate change strategy.
We have developed a risk-based asset management process
to help us determine future investment needs that balance risk,
cost and performance. We call this BGASP, our Below Ground
Asset Surveyor and Predictor. We have used this system to
develop a targeted structural mains replacement programme
that will involve investment of £75 million to replace 228 km
of main in the period 2015-2020.
We have used an innovative piece of software called VASTNet
to identify water mains which serve more than 10,000
properties and that do not currently have any alternative means
of supply. We are investigating how to improve the resilience
of these pipelines on a case by case basis. One option might be
to lay an alternative, duplicate section of main at critical points
where the original runs through a river, road or other hard-toaccess area.
We are aware of particular areas where extreme weather
presents a risk of supply interruption. To help reduce or
eliminate this risk we will be increasing mains capacity and
network storage, as well as working on projects to manage
network pressure. In addition to these capital investment
solutions, we are enhancing our operational response.
To allow us to respond to bursts and other issues more
quickly and in a more targeted way, we will be enhancing
our visibility of the network by installing a further 4,500
data loggers that automatically send data to our regional
command centre every 30 minutes. We have also identified
a range of initiatives following a review of major incidents,
including earlier recognition of incidents, further training,
and improved communications and escalation processes.
Resilient water treatment
Our WTWs are very reliable. However, there is a risk that we
cannot treat water fast enough when harsh weather combines
with high demand. We focus on this aspect here. The ability to
treat pollutants can also be a risk, as discussed in section B1 .
We will continue the large and important task of maintaining
our WTWs. We have developed a risk-based asset management
process to help us determine future investment needs that
balance risk, cost and performance. We call this AGASP, our
Above Ground Asset Surveyor and Predictor. The system
enables us to predict when an asset will break down, based
on the age and condition.
By 2020 we will invest in two key areas to enhance our
resilience to extreme weather risks at WTWs:
• The severe winter of 2010/11 highlighted a risk to water
supply in the Keighley area. The local treatment works
struggled to produce enough water to meet demand.
We will enhance supply resilience by modernising the
local WTW which is reaching the end of its asset life.
• One of our small WTW can become inaccessible in
winter because it is located over 600 metres above
sea level in a steep, remote valley in the Yorkshire Dales.
This makes maintenance and delivery of chemicals
difficult or impossible in winter conditions. The works
can also be forced to shut down when intense rainfall
sharply increases colour in the raw water received, most
recently in August 2013. Following optioneering we have
determined that the best Whole Life Cost solution is to
close the works permanently and provide a robust
network supply from a more accessible WTW.
B2.4 Maintaining supplies during
extreme weather
We recognise that there is a limit to the level of resilience
we can design into any system. There is always a risk that
the most extreme dry, wet or cold events could interrupt
customer supplies. We therefore have mature emergency
plans and facilities in place. In this section we describe our
Drought Plan. We also have Winter Plans to cope with
extreme cold, which we discuss in Section B5 .
Planning for drought
Our Drought Plan has been developed using extensive
experience gained during drought events such as those
in 1995/96, 2003 and 2011/12. Together with the WRMP,
these documents set out how we will maintain a defined
Level of Service during normal and drought periods for both
the short and long-term. The Level of Service we provide is:
Temporary use bans
like hosepipe bans
1:25 years on average
Drought permits / orders
1:80 years on average
Rota cuts / standpipes
1:>500 years*
*This is an estimate of an exceptionally rare event.
It is important to note these frequencies are an average over
a long period and do not preclude a more frequent occurrence
if there is a particular run of very dry years. For example, it
is possible for a 1:25 year weather event to occur twice in
relatively quick succession, but on average it will only occur
once every 25 years.
Our Drought Plan contains a framework of options that allow
a drought to be best managed dependent on conditions. The
Plan is flexible and accounts for a range of possible scenarios
because all droughts are different in terms of location, extent,
severity and impact. The Drought Plan always reflects latest
understanding because it is reviewed every three years. In
the event of a drought, our advance planning enables us to
act quickly because our options have been assessed for their
cost and environmental impact, and agreed with the EA. The
Drought Plan includes the following elements to allow us to
manage a drought situation:
• Communication plans
• Measures that might be required to reduce customer demand
• Measures that might be needed to obtain extra water supplies
Customer voice
“We definitely don’t think about
the water service in our house,
it’s just instant and there all the
time. …if I couldn’t go to the
tap and get water it would be
horrendous.”
Domestic customer from
Northallerton, 201219
40 | Part B: Adaptation
• How we will monitor the effects of the drought and our
response measures.
We are legally required to produce, consult on, and publish a
Drought Plan every three and a half years, following guidelines
published by the EA. Our latest Drought Plan can be found on
our website yorkshirewater.com/our-environment/waterresources/drought-plan.asp .
Quantifying our drought risk
We use our WRAPsim model to estimate the supply and
demand impacts of different drought severities. This helps us
determine our ability to meet demand and the frequency of
restrictions that might need to be imposed. Extensive weather
records dating back almost 150 years are used to inform our
planning. Our modelled records go back to 1920 and include the
many notable droughts that have occurred in that time period.
Damflask Reservoir during
a dry period in 2003
We have assessed the probability of multi-year droughts in
Yorkshire. These would be the most challenging because
water stocks might not be sufficiently replenished over the
winter period as would normally occur. Working with experts
at WRc we found that we should expect a two-year drought
once every 40 to 70 years in the south of our region, and every
100 years or more in the north of our region. A three-year
drought is likely to occur less frequently than once in 400 years.
Such an event has not been experienced in Yorkshire since
records began. The frequency of such long duration droughts
could increase to as little as 1:100 years under some of the
more extreme climate change scenarios.
Managing drought
We continuously monitor our water resources and produce a
weekly Water Situation Report which we share with the EA.
This process checks stocks against various ‘control lines’ which
provide an indication of the state of our water resources, for
example indicating normal operations, early warning and
drought conditions. We then use our WRAPlan software to
optimise our use of available water resources to meet demands
and maintain security of supply in the most efficient way.
As a drought materialises, we escalate our interventions as
increasingly severe control lines are approached or crossed.
A wide range of measures have been pre-assessed for their
effectiveness and environmental impact. We start with demand
reduction measures such as water conservation campaigns,
temporary use bans, leakage control and restriction of use
orders. Supply side measures include reducing compensation
flows from reservoirs, increasing our existing abstraction licenses
and re-commissioning unused resources. Supply side options
involve an environmental monitoring plan and protection
measures such as creating fish refuges in low flow rivers.
41 | Part B: Adaptation
We would consider long-term drought actions when the
drought control lines have been crossed in reservoirs and
we are in the second year of a drought. Such actions
include, for example, inter-company transfers and building
de-salination plants.
Communication and collaboration are essential during a
drought. We liaise with the EA and other organisations to
ensure alignment and to minimise environmental impacts.
B2.5 Our long-term plans
Over the next 25 years we plan to invest £5.5 billion to meet
the challenges of the growing population and the reduced
availability of raw water driven by climate change. The
investment will be targeted at:
• Increasing the number of household customers on
metered supplies from 48% to 80%.
• Further reducing leakage from our water mains network
by 14% to 254 Ml/d.
• Improving the resilience of our critical infrastructure
to flooding.
• Managing risk within our WTW’s and network assets to reliably
deliver water to our customers without interrupting supplies.
To ensure that our water mains network remains capable
of delivering reliable supplies, and avoiding unacceptable
levels of interruption, we plan to increase maintenance
activity by 45%. This will result in the performance of the
mains remaining stable in the long-term.
We will continue to develop how we integrate the impacts
of climate change in our planning and will review and update
our plans at regular intervals to ensure that we always act on
the latest available data.
B3: Protecting people and the environment from sewer flooding
Section summary
• We are using advanced modelling techniques to
better understand our sewer network and target
intervention. This is increasingly helping us to
address failures before they impact the customer
or the environment.
• We have delivered significant progress on reducing
sewer flooding and pollution through targeted investment
and operational activities. We recognise there is more
to do because there are many current and future
pressures on our sewerage network, including climate
change, population growth and urban development.
The increasing flow to combined sewers could cause an
increase in sewer flooding and pollution.
• By working with others and using storm water
management techniques like Sustainable Drainage
Systems (SuDS), we plan to reduce the amount of
rainwater entering the sewer. The rainwater can
instead be put to good use for biodiversity, recreation
and aesthetic value.
• Traditionally, we use a range of operational and
investment responses to manage sewer flooding
and pollution. For example, a typical investment
response might be to increase sewer and pumping
capacity. This approach is becoming increasingly
unsustainable both financially and environmentally.
We are responding by evolving our approach to sewer
management and broadening our portfolio of options.
Main climate change risks being addressed (full details in Appendix 1
2013: As we stand today
Risk title
Trend
2013
2080s
2020
2030s
2050s
2080s
Risk
understanding
2013
WW1:
Overloaded
sewers cause
flooding
Med
Med
WW2:
Overloaded
sewers cause
pollution
Med
Med
WW3: Outfalls
restricted by sea
level rise
Low
Low
B2: Affordability
Low
Low
Medium risk
2050s
2020: After our next
round of risk mitigation
2012
High risk
2030s
)
Low risk
Outcomes being supported
We take care of your waste water and protect you and the environment from sewer flooding
We protect and improve the water environment
Progress measure for this theme of action
Measure:
Current performance:
Future target:
42 | Part B: Adaptation
Long-term stability and reliability factor: Sewer network
Stable (2014/15)
Stable (2019/20)
The maintenance and enhancement of our sewer network
is an enormous and ongoing task. We collect one billion litres
of waste water every day using over 52,000 km of sewer
pipes, 1,800 sewage pumping stations and 1,200 storage
tanks. Our responsibility grew considerably in 2011 when
we took over responsibility for 22,000 km of private sewers
following a legislative change. It will grow further when we
take responsibility for about 720 private sewage pumping
stations in 2016.
With an ageing infrastructure, and 81% of our sewers
receiving storm water, it is not surprising that the network
becomes overloaded, causing both sewer flooding and
pollution. An overloaded or blocked sewer can result in
the following problems:
Customer voice
“...the weather is getting more
extreme, so I think the current
sewage system is going to be
unable to cope. We are seeing
the odd roads that are flooded
but it will probably get worse.”
A domestic customer in Doncaster, 201323
• Sewer flooding when flows in the sewer are so
high that they back up and escape at the lowest
available exit, sometimes within a property or into
gardens and community spaces.
• Inability to drain surface water when there is
no further capacity in the network.
• Aesthetic and/or water quality pollution
when Combined Sewer Overflows (CSOs) operate
to protect against the two above issues.
Significant investment has delivered marked improvement
in pollution and flooding over recent decades. We have
more than halved the number of properties flooded internally
with sewage since 1997/98. We have tackled polluting CSOs
by increasing sewer capacity at problem locations to reduce
the frequency at which they operate. We have also added
fine screens to many of our CSOs to minimise the aesthetic
impact of sewage litter by keeping it in the sewerage system
for safe removal at the treatment works.
Stakeholder voice
“...PR14 should see strong
foundations put in place for
longer term sewerage
planning... Government expects
these strategic plans to include
appropriate sustainable
measures for managing flood
risks, such as sustainable
drainage solutions (SuDS).”
Defra, 2013
14
Climate change and other pressures are increasing the burden
on our sewer system and the associated risk of flooding and
pollution. More frequent, more intense rainfall is projected
while urban development is reducing the amount of permeable
surface. Recent research found that sewer flood volumes could
increase by 51% by about 2040 because of climate change,
population and growth in impermeable areas (Ofwat, 201129).
The research looked at a number of scenarios, 51% was the
median increase in 1:10 year sewer flood volumes.
We are evolving our approach to sewer management to
mitigate current and future pressures. This is essential because
our customers have told us they expect us to protect them and
the environment from overflowing sewers. It is also important
to enable sustainable growth of businesses and homes in
our region. Our existing approach and future plans for sewer
management align closely with the aspirations of the Drainage
Strategy Framework that has recently been published by our
regulators at the Environment Agency (EA) and the Office of
Water Services (Ofwat), 2013.30
Our approach can be summarised in these themes of activity:
• Operational and investment programmes to
maintain and enhance our performance on sewer
flooding and pollution, section B3.1 .
• Adapting our approach with new techniques to
more affordably and more effectively manage storm
waters, including Sustainable Drainage Systems (SuDS),
section B3.2 .
• Advanced modelling to improve our understanding
of risks and response options. We call this Drainage
Area Planning (DAP), section B3.3 .
• Partnership working to ensure optimal flood management
operations and investments, section B3.4 .
• Customers waste disposal behaviours have an
important role to play. This is described in section A2
43 | Part B: Adaptation
.
Customer voice
“I would like to know they
are spending a proportion
of my bill to help if my house
was in a flood area to help
protect that house.”
We will continue our programme of sewer rehabilitation and
target areas at high risk of flooding or pollution. We will invest
£84 million to maintain current levels of internal sewer flooding
performance in the period 2015-2020. To maintain our position
we expect a need to protect about 400 properties.
A colleague
working on the
sewerage system
A domestic customer in Ripon, 201323
B3.1 Targeted operational and
investment programmes
We traditionally use a range of operational and investment
activities to maintain and enhance our sewer network, all
informed by a risk-based approach based on best available
evidence. Recent activities and future plans include:
Operational teams proactively identify and mitigate risks
and respond to failures when they occur. We will continue
activities like sewer surveying and jetting to identify and
remove blockages before they result in a failure that impacts
customers or the environment.
Sewer rehabilitation is the repair or replacement of sewers
that are no longer able to provide an effective service or have
a high risk of failure. We have used our Below Ground Asset
Surveyor and Predictor (BGASP) tool to target investment
where there is a risk of pollution or property flooding.
Major impact sewers are those which have the potential
to cause exceptionally high impacts due to their size, depth
and locations. We operate three major tunnels and in excess
of 269 km of sewers over 1,500 mm diameter. We survey
these high risk assets to inform our activities.
Above ground pipes and sewer pumping stations are
surveyed and investment is targeted using our Above Ground
Asset Surveyor and Predictor (AGASP) tool.
CSOs have been inspected to identify those presenting a risk to
river or bathing water quality. We have assessed the probability
and impact of an asset failure to inform our investment needs.
For example, we will be investing to replace or enhance two sea
outfalls in Scarborough.
CCTV and remote monitoring is used to gain better
understanding of our network. We use this to target our
resources and are increasingly able to intervene before a
failure causes an impact to the customer or environment.
We plan to increase our sewer monitoring assets. For example,
monitoring is being introduced on all overflows that could
impact bathing water quality.
Privately owned sewers and drains transferred to water
companies in 2011 following a change in legislation. Private
sewage pumping stations will transfer in 2016. We continue
to develop our understanding of the number, size, age and
condition of this substantial quantity of new assets. We are
taking a risk based approach to data collection and intervention.
44 | Part B: Adaptation
B3.2 Adapting our approach
to sewer management
Our traditional approach to sewer management has delivered
essential benefits for public health and environmental protection.
We recognise that our approach needs to evolve to affordably
meet future pressures from climate change, ageing infrastructure,
population growth and urban development. At the heart of our
evolving approach is recognition that we cannot simply build
more and ever larger sewers. This might remain the right option
in some cases but it will increasingly be too costly, both financially
and environmentally.
We believe the most sustainable approach is to work in
partnership with others to reduce the amount of rain water
entering sewers. This can be done through a range of
techniques that store and hold back rainwater, making good
use of it for many benefits to biodiversity, recreation and
aesthetic value. There are also urban cooling benefits which
could be increasingly important to counteract the impacts of
warming trends caused by climate change.
Customer voice
The majority (82%) said it
would be unacceptable for
their water company to allow
more pollution incidents or
sewer flooding events.
Our research, 201219
Techniques are varied and could include everything from
ponds to water butts to permeable paving. We are working
to broaden our portfolio of potential sewer management
response solutions to include all of these options, for example:
• Storm water management and SuDS application
continues to mature in the UK. There is ongoing discussion
between the government, local authorities, water
companies and housing developers. We are working
to integrate storm water management into our decision
making processes. We outline our detailed approach
in our position paper on ‘Storm Water Management’.
This will be shared with our regulators and is available
on request. We will develop and publish a detailed storm
water management strategy by the end of 2017.
• Modular design – We will investigate if it is cost-effective
to use modular design to affordably enhance our short-term
position, while leaving options open for further intervention
in the longer term. For example by building some sewer
storage today, with design and land to extend this in the
future if it becomes necessary.
• Area-wide solutions – We have assessed the costs and
benefits of installing an area-wide solution that addresses
multiple sewer capacity issues, rather than a number of
separate local solutions. We will consider if it is effective
to progress any such approaches.
• Impact prevention techniques like non-return valves
and flood gates. These approaches may be effective in
preventing the impact of overflowing sewers even where
it not economically justifiable to remove the root cause.
• Standards for new development – We will keep the
standards we require of new developments under review
to encourage flow reduction techniques where appropriate.
• Real time monitoring – We will be developing and
extending our use of remote monitors in the sewers and
on storm overflows to allow effective operational intervention
and more accurate modelling. We intend to provide
monitoring at the vast majority of our storm overflows
by 2020.
B3.3 Advanced modelling to
inform our planning
We are committed to improving our understanding of the
performance and condition of our drainage network. This
is necessary so we can adapt our operational and investment
responses to maintain and enhance our sewerage service to
cope with long-term pressures like climate change.
Drainage Area Plans (DAP)
Our DAPs use hydraulic models to analyse the condition and
performance of the sewer network to identify current and
predicted risks by analysing a range of scenarios. We input
different rainfall events into the models to identify current
sewer capacity issues and predict where they are likely to occur
in the future. This data will inform our planning and help us
optimise future operational and investment interventions.
We are developing DAPs for our 300 drainage area zones
on a prioritised basis over 25 years. We are on target to
achieve this, and believe that delivery should be accelerated
to support our commitment to maintaining service to all our
customers. We began our programme in 2010, and have
recently started to complete our first DAPs and share findings
with stakeholders to inform planning.
45 | Part B: Adaptation
Stakeholder voice
“Greater understanding of
the hydraulic and operational
performance of your sewerage
network, and interactions with
other flooding mechanisms,
will enable effective
investment planning...”
Environment Agency, 20133
We will have produced 68 of our most important DAPs by
2015. In addition to our DAP programme, we have also
developed hydraulic models to inform our coastal investments,
our multi-agency studies (described in more detail below) and
for specific capital investments.
We will continue a similar scale of investment in our DAP
programme in the planning period 2015-2020. Our work
will involve maintaining existing DAPs, building new ones
and engaging on our findings with stakeholders to inform
future planning. By 2020 we will have DAPs covering 64%
of the Yorkshire population.
We have recently finished a project with national hydraulic
modelling experts at HR Wallingford to produce future rainfall
time-series and antecedent wetness conditions specific to the
Yorkshire region. The data includes uplifts to account for climate
change using the 2009 climate projections (UKCP09). There is a
range of uplifts that can be used for the 2030s and 2080s time
frames, summer and winter seasons, and 50, 90, 95 percentile
probabilities. We will use this data in all our future DAP work to
quantify the risks that climate change presents to our sewerage
service. This will integrate with existing approaches to model
other pressures like population and new development. Together
this will enable us to effectively target our interventions.
Urban Pollution Management (UPM)
Our UPM studies use advanced models to investigate
environmental water quality problems associated with our
sewerage network. The outputs of these studies are shared
with the EA and inform the investment needed to achieve
Good Ecological Status as required by the Water Framework
Directive (WFD). We are working on how to incorporate
climate change into this decision making, as described in the
DAP section above.
We have recently completed eight UPM studies covering nine
water bodies. The process identified a small number of storm
overflows where our sewerage system is restricting the rivers’
ability to achieve Good Ecological Status. These overflows will
be enhanced in the period 2015-2020. Traditional solutions
would include extra storage capacity in the sewer system,
although more innovative approaches will be considered at the
detailed design stage.
Working with the EA, we have identified a number of further
studies that will be completed in the period 2015-2020. These
will inform future investment needs.
An example of a Sustainable Drainage
Solution (SuDS) in the United States
B3.4 Partnership
We are one of many organisations that have an essential
role to play in Yorkshire’s flood management. Our primary
role is to maintain and enhance the public sewer network.
We work closely with organisations like the EA, Highways
Authorities, Internal Drainage Boards and local authorities.
We recognise that we need to work even closer together in
the future to deliver the best outcomes for Yorkshire. We are
investigating the potential to allocate 10% of our flood risk
programme to partnership; working with other flood risk
management authorities in the period 2015-2020.
Regional engagement
We are an active member in our region’s formal flood
management structures. Our dedicated Flood Strategy Team
attend the Regional Flood and Coastal Committee (RFCC)
and all four sub-regional Strategic Partnership meetings.
Our engineers meet regularly with all Lead Local Flood
Authorities (LLFAs) and the EA for technical meetings. In
practice this engagement means that we share information
and resources, carry out training exercises, discuss future
plans and consider joint working opportunities. We have
pioneered a data exchange protocol to proactively share
information on our sewerage network and its performance
with the region’s flood management organisations. Through
our regular engagement we will continue to review all projects
to identify where partnership working is most appropriate.
Multi agency studies
We have worked in partnership with the EA and several
local authorities on multi-agency studies driven by the Flood
and Water Management Act (2010). The studies assess the
integrated flood risk in key locations by bringing together
models, data and expertise from all the relevant organisations
involved in an area’s drainage. Relevant organisations work
together to develop an effective, joined-up approach to
priority flood risks.
The three main studies have been in Hull, Leeds and Sheffield.
To date, best available evidence has been used in all three
investigations and no significant investment needs have been
identified for the sewerage network. We will continue to
maintain our sewerage system and respond to local sewerage
issues. We are a key player in these cities’ flood management
strategies and will remain closely involved with relevant
discussions and planning.
46 | Part B: Adaptation
In Leeds there is potential for some of our assets to be
compromised by changes to proposed river flow arrangements.
We will continue to work with the Leeds project team to ensure
our customers’ current levels of service are not compromised.
In Hull the local topography presents significant challenges
to us and other flood risk management authorities. We will
be continuing to work with partners to define the long-term
objectives and approach.
We continue to work with our partners on a study at Goole.
A report is expected soon and will help those organisations
involved define the appropriate way forward.
We will continue to support multi-agency studies.
B3.5 Our long-term plans
Over the next 25 years we plan to invest £3.6 billion to maintain
current levels of service and meet the needs of Yorkshire’s
growing population. The investment will be targeted at:
• Protecting a further 2,000 properties from internal flooding
from sewers.
• Reducing spills from sewer overflows to protect the water
environment and comply with legislative requirements.
• Providing additional capacity for 855,000 more people
living in Yorkshire.
• Increasing levels of remote sensing and telemetry in our
sewerage network to help us prevent problems before
they impact on the customer or environment.
• Managing risk within our waste water network assets to
reliably transport sewage for treatment, driving toward
100% compliance with permits.
We are planning to sustain significant levels of investment
in tackling sewer flooding over the next 25 years. We plan
a 20% increase in our maintenance activity over the period
2020-2030 to address the long-term sustainability of assets
and services, with particular focus on the resilience of the
sewerage network. We plan for this activity to increase by
a further 15% through to 2050.
We will continue to develop how we integrate the impacts
of climate change in our planning. We will review and update
our plans at regular intervals to ensure that we always act on
the latest available data.
More details can be found on our website
blueprintforyorkshire.com
B4: Improving the environment
Section summary
• Healthy habitats and species are best able to resist
pressures such as climate change. We have an important
role to play because we interact with the environment
every second of every day and we are a large landowner.
• We have delivered dramatic improvements in river
and coastal water quality by enhancing waste water
treatment over the last 20 years. We will be delivering
further enhancements in response to legislative drivers.
New waste water treatment capabilities can be capital
and carbon intensive so we have been investigating
sustainable alternatives to protect and enhance the
water environment.
• Partnership is a central part of our approach to
environmental management. We have been
successful in restoring large areas of our own land
and working with others to protect their land.
We have also worked with partners to develop
approaches to improve fish passage and river
restoration. We have plans to further our efforts.
Main climate change risks being addressed (full details in Appendix 1
2013: As we stand today
Risk title
Trend
2013
2080s
2020
2030s
2050s
2080s
Risk
understanding
2013
WE1: Biodiversity
Low
Med
WE2: Treating
sewage in hot/dry
Low
Low
B2: Affordability
Low
Low
Medium risk
2050s
2020: After our next
round of risk mitigation
2012
High risk
2030s
)
Low risk
Outcomes being supported
We take care of your waste water and protect you and the environment from sewer flooding
We protect and improve the water environment
We understand our impact on the wider environment and act responsibly
Progress measure for this theme of action
Measure:
Current performance:
Future target:
47 | Part B: Adaptation
Long-term stability and reliability factor: Waste water quality
Stable (2014/15)
Stable (2019/20)
Our state-of-the-art waste
water treatment works at
Knostrop in Leeds
We have an important role in managing the environment.
We are a large landowner, we abstract water for our
customers and we safely return their waste water to rivers
and the sea. Environmental protection is an adaptation
measure because healthy species and habitats are best
placed to cope with a changing climate.
Environmental management is part of every aspect of our
climate change strategy and in this section we focus on
these priorities:
• Improving and safeguarding the quality of
the water environment, section B4.1
• Improving and safeguarding the biodiversity
quality of our land, section B4.2
• Managing invasive species, section B4.3
Customer voice
“…I think it is important to
look after the environment
and the rivers.”
A small business customer, 201323
We describe elsewhere in this document the many other
risks that climate change presents to our interactions with
the environment. For example we examine our role:
• Working with other landowners to protect
the environment, section B1
• Protecting the natural environment when we
abstract water for supply, section B2
• Managing the impact of intermittent waste
water discharges, section B3
• Maintaining waste water treatment services
during extreme weather, section B5
• Reducing our impact on the atmospheric
environment, part C .
48 | Part B: Adaptation
Our new fish
pass at Rodley
B4.1 Improving the water
environment
The UK has seen a dramatic improvement in the health of
many rivers following substantial investment in recent decades
(Defra, 201131). We have delivered a step change in waste
water treatment over the last 20 years to improve the quality
of Yorkshire’s rivers. This investment has met the requirements
of EU environmental water quality legislation and provided a
firm foundation for habitats and species to cope with pressures
such as climate change. However, we recognise that there is
more to do.
We have worked with the Environment Agency (EA) to
model the impact of our discharges across the whole region
to understand the ecological implications. Together, we
have defined a programme of environmental investment and
investigation needs, totalling over £300m between 2015-2020.
We will further enhance our waste water treatment capabilities
where we have confirmed biological and/or chemical issues
that need to meet legislative standards. Where there is
uncertainty, we will be carrying out investigations to inform
our long-term approach.
While delivering environmental water quality benefits, the
new waste water treatment capabilities described above are
often capital- and carbon-intensive. They are also relatively
inflexible to the uncertain needs of the future, with fixed and
robust concrete structures. We have been working in partnership
to trial more affordable and lower carbon alternatives that could
replace the need for new waste water treatment capabilities.
For example, at Cudworth Dyke in Barnsley we are investigating
if river restoration can effectively improve water quality rather
than traditional engineering solutions.
We plan to increase our efforts in this area because Defra
recognise that such activities can contribute significantly to
the overall objective of the Biodiversity Strategy for England,
‘Biodiversity 2020’. Below are two examples of our plans to
improve the water environment through innovative approaches:
• Fish passes: Following feasibility work and consultation with
the EA and Rivers Trusts, we have prioritised a series of our
sites for fish passage schemes. The removal of barriers to fish
passage, such as weirs and pipe crossings, will help many
water bodies achieve the standards required by the Water
Framework Directive (WFD). Fish passes help fish to find the
safest reaches of the river during floods and drought.
• Eel passes and screens: We have identified three sites
where eels need better protection from our abstraction
operations to ensure compliance with the Eel Regulations.
Stakeholder voice
“Statutory undertakers, in
their Business Plans, will
need to include those actions
deemed necessary both to
remedy adverse impacts on,
and to maintain and enhance
the condition of, SSSIs in
2015-2020 and beyond.”
Defra, 2013
14
B4.2 Protecting the land we own
We are one of the largest landowners in Yorkshire, with
approximately 29,000 hectares of land. The majority of our
land forms the catchments of our reservoirs. This includes land
rented by farmers, moorland peat, woodland of mixed age
and species, and reservoirs. In this section we focus on why
our land holdings and management practices are important
to protect biodiversity in the changing climate.
Over half of our land contain habitats and wildlife which
are important enough to be designated as Sites of Special
Scientific Interest (SSSI). They are also Special Areas of
Conservation (SACs) or Special Protection Areas (SPAs)
under the EU Habitats and Birds Directives. We recognise
the significant responsibility we have in managing our land
for the benefit of biodiversity. We are successfully restoring
our land following years of damage caused by air pollution,
intensive grazing, drainage and wild fires. Over 95% of
our SSSIs are now in target ‘favourable’ or ‘recovering’
condition, up from 57% in 2003. Our future plans build on
this success, for example:
• SSSI Programme: Maintain and enhance the
performance stated above through a programme
of land management activities.
• Priority habitat restoration: We have worked with
Natural England to identify sites where we will deliver the
best biodiversity value for money, such as wildlife corridors
which will be valuable in supporting species extend their
range in the changing climate.
• Woodland: By 2020 we will have completed a 10 year
programme to restore 150 hectares of ancient woodland.
We also plan to investigate the location and health of veteran
trees on our land, and take measures to secure their survival.
• Capital works enhancement: In accordance with the
Natural Environment and Rural Communities (NERC) Act,
we will look for opportunities for biodiversity enhancement
projects delivered in conjunction with our capital
construction programme. This can be a cost-effective
way of delivering enhancements and ‘leaving a positive
biodiversity legacy’. For example, we could consider
greening urban areas to help reduce the urban heat island
effect that is likely to be exacerbated by climate change.
49 | Part B: Adaptation
B4.3 Managing invasive species
Climate change is one of many factors that can affect the
spread of invasive species. There are two main issues from
invasive species:
1. Managing the impact on our assets and operations
Our assets and operations are directly affected by invasive
species, causing financial cost and threatening compliance
and service. For example, water intakes bring the zebra
mussel larvae that are native to Russia directly into Water
Treatment Works (WTW) where the mussels clog pipes
and other equipment. The problems are managed through
removal at considerable financial expense.
2. Managing the impact on native species and the natural
environment Invasive species can compete for resources
with native species. 1% of waters in the Humber River Basin
District failing to reach WFD Good Ecological Status because
of invasive species (Environment Agency, 201332).
We will take the following actions to help control the impact
of invasive species, thereby helping native species be in the
strongest state to resist climate change:
• A risk based programme to control and eradicate pest species
listed on Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981 Schedule 9.
• A scheme to investigate and trial approaches to remove
Crassula on the Gouthwaite reservoir, which is causing the
area to fail its SSSI requirements.
• Partnership projects to address riparian invasive species as
part of river catchment strategy. This involves landowners
collaboratively working together on whole stretches of river
to maximise the success of controlling problem species.
B4.4 Our long-term plans
Over the next 25 years we plan to invest £6.8 billion to
maintain the environmental improvements delivered to date.
We will also make further improvements to meet European
and government expectations for improved water habitats.
The investment will be targeted at:
• Improving the performance of our Waste water Treatment
Works (WwTW), storm overflows and contributing to the
improvement of rivers to meet the requirements of the WFD.
• Improving the resilience of our assets to flooding.
• Managing risk within our WwTW and network assets to
reliably convey sewage for enhanced treatment prior to
safely discharging treated effluent to the water environment.
To achieve the benefits of the WFD we will significantly increase
our investment on environmental enhancement between the
periods 2010-2015 and 2015-2020. This will need to increase
further in the subsequent period in 2020-2025. We expect the
enhancement investment required for the WFD to tail off in the
late 2020s. As this expenditure declines, we will need to increase
our maintenance expenditure by 20% to ensure the long-term
sustainability of our WwTWs.
We will continue to develop how we integrate the impacts
of climate change in our planning. We will review and update
our plans at regular intervals to ensure that we always act on
the latest available data.
Further information
More details can be found on our website
blueprintforyorkshire.com
B5: Enhancing the resilience of our critical assets and services
Section summary
• Before 2020, we will enhance our resilience through
a number of priority interventions. We have used the
Cabinet Office model for infrastructure resilience (20115)
to ensure a holistic and optimal approach. For example,
we will procure demountable flood defences to enhance
our emergency response capabilities. We will relocate
several assets at imminent risk from coastal erosion.
We will also continue to use latest knowledge to
develop our risk understanding and inform our plans.
• We manage resilience to all hazards through our
operational and risk management processes. Our
approach is one of the key components of our
climate change strategy because it is critical to our
ability to maintain services and has been successful
in many recent events.
• We have quantified the risk to our assets and services
from drought, fluvial flooding and coastal erosion.
These assessments have considered both past weather
and future climate to enable effective long-term
decision making.
• It is a long-term priority to further enhance the
resilience of our assets to ensure we can maintain
services in the changing climate. We would like to
see the Cabinet Office resilience standards enforced
in regulation or legislation.
Main climate change risks being addressed (full details in Appendix 1
2013: As we stand today
Risk title
Trend
2013
2080s
2020
2030s
2050s
2080s
Risk
understanding
2013
CS1: Flooding of
our assets
Med
Med
CS3: Coastal
erosion
Med
High
CS7: Freezing
treatment works
Med
Med
CS12: Resilient
supply chain,
including grid
electricity
Low
Low
B2: Affordability
Low
Low
Medium risk
2050s
2020: After our next
round of risk mitigation
2012
High risk
2030s
)
Low risk
Outcomes being supported
We provide you with water that is clean and safe to drink
We make sure that you always have enough water
We take care of your waste water and protect you and the environment from sewer flooding
We provide the level of customer service you expect and value
Progress measure for this theme of action
Measure:
Current performance:
Future target:
50 | Part B: Adaptation
Number of Service Commitment failures against our guaranteed levels of service
15,267 failures in 2014/15
Reduction from 2014/15 baseline (2019/20)
Achieving resilient services requires us to review a broad
range of hazards, known as an ‘all-hazards’ approach. An
array of mitigation measures are integrated within our
standard operational and risk management processes. Our
approach has worked well through numerous recent extreme
weather events that have tested UK utilities and infrastructure
providers, including ourselves. For example we felt the
challenges of the 2007 floods, the hard winters of 2009/10
and 2010/11, and the drought come floods of 2012.
Our approach to resilience is one of the key components of
our climate change strategy. We use the Cabinet Office
guidance and four box model for infrastructure resilience
(20115). This model shows the range of measures required
to deliver effective resilience, including both operational and
investment responses. The model is shown below.
In this section, we first examine our overarching business
resilience measures and then look at a series of weatherspecific resilience issues that are relevant to our entire asset
base. In previous sections we have examined the resilience
of each of our core services, for example drought is covered
in section B2 .
Customer voice
“Flooding, heavy rain and
coastal erosion, along with
milder and colder winters were
all felt to have become more
frequent, and more than half
felt flooding, heavy rain and
coastal erosion had become
more severe, and were likely to
become more so by 2050.”
A survey by Defra, 201318
Some examples of our provisions and approach include:
Resistance
Protection to withstand
a hazard
(e.g. a flood wall)
Reliability
The ability of an asset
to operate in a range
of conditions
(e.g. asset design)
Infrastructure
resilience
Redundancy
Design capacity
into a system
(e.g. backup pumps)
Response
and recovery
Enabling fast and
effective response to, and
recovery from, an event
(e.g. emergency planning)
B5.1 Enhancing our overarching
business resilience
We manage all risks to the delivery of our business objectives
through our corporate risk management systems. We have
integrated within these systems our strategic climate change
and extreme weather risks. Centrally we also hold more
detailed information in our climate change risk register.
Emergency response and recovery
We have extensive emergency plans to enable a fast
and effective response to, and recovery from, an asset or
service failure event. Such plans are an important part of
our response to climate change because there is a limit to
the level of resilience designed into any system. This can be
limited, for example, by affordability, engineering capability
and technical understanding. Our plans make special provision
for vulnerable customers and establishments, such as care
homes. Our approach has been successful when tested
during the extreme weather events of recent years.
51 | Part B: Adaptation
• Our regional control centre provides the central point
for coordination of any incident. It operates 24 hours
every day of the year. Incidents are managed using real
time performance data, remote management control
and field teams.
• Our Incident Management Framework provides a staged
response to ensure the effective allocation of resource to
any incident. As necessary, different levels of management
team are established to implement plans and dynamically
manage an unfolding incident.
• We have emergency plans, strategic stockpiles of
critical materials and a mutual aid agreement with our
neighbouring water companies. We are required to develop
and maintain plans and facilities to ensure the provision of
essential services in times of emergency by the Security and
Emergency Measures Direction (SEMD). These plans are
externally audited each year on behalf of Defra.
• We have a Board-approved business continuity policy and
follow the requirements of ISO22301, the International
Standard for Business Continuity. We have a rolling
programme to test critical systems and processes.
• We work with the local and regional resilience forums
and other essential service providers, like the police, to
plan for emergencies and consider our mutual reliance.
We are also a member of the Lifeline Services Group which
is a forum for all northern utilities to share intelligence and
best practice and discuss any cross-sector issues. This has
meant, for example, that our standby rotas have been
tailored to mirror police command structures. We have also
undertaken various joint training exercises and we have
shared understanding of each other’s businesses.
• Insurance cover is an essential backstop to support the
costs of responding to notable damage caused by the
most extreme events. For example, we claimed on our
insurance to help cover our costs incurred in the 2007
floods. That event exceeded the ceiling of our cover at
the time and we have since increased our level of cover.
We continually improve our emergency response and recovery
capabilities. In the period to 2020 we plan to invest in additional
emergency supplies like high capacity pumps and demountable
flood defences. We will also upgrade our alternative water
supply strategy that we prepare to ensure basic water services
during a major incident, for example reviewing our contracting
arrangements for bowsers, tankers and bottled water.
Managing supply chain dependencies and
interdependencies
Extreme weather and climate change could interrupt critical
elements of our supply chain. Electricity, chemicals and telecoms,
for example, are essential to our water and waste water services.
Some of our suppliers are also reliant on our services for their
functions, resulting in an interdependence. We have a good
understanding of our critical dependencies and manage the
associated risks through our standard operational and risk
management processes, some of which are outlined above.
To focus on one example, we are highly dependent on grid
electricity as we cannot pump and treat water and waste
water without it. Equally, electricity generators are dependent
on water from the natural environment for cooling, as well
as water and waste water services for staff and activities.
This results in a critical interdependence between the water
and energy sectors. We work with the energy sector to
ensure resilient energy for us and others, by:
• Designing reliability into our critical systems with
dual supplies, emergency generators and batteries.
• Agreeing emergency response plans, with our critical
sites prioritised in the event of national shortages, and
contracts for portable generators when needed.
• Minimising our need for grid supplies with increasing
capacity to generate our own renewable electricity.
• Relieving pressure on the national grid at peak times
by reducing our electricity demand and providing to
the grid the electricity we generate.
B5.2 Enhancing our resilience
to flood inundation
Yorkshire has experienced significant flooding challenges in
recent years, most notably during the summer of 2007. Climate
change projections suggest that future flooding will be more
severe and more frequent because a warmer atmosphere holds
more moisture. Our strategic climate change risk assessment
found that flooding of our assets was one of the most pressing
risks facing the business because of the potential to impact
service and compliance with regulations. In addition we
describe our approach to sewer flooding in section B3 .
We have worked with national experts at Halcrow to identify
our assets at risk from fluvial flooding. Of around 1,200 assets
identified to be in areas prone to flooding, approximately
200 critical assets were prioritised for detailed assessment.
These sites are deemed critical because of the number of
people they serve and the potential impact that would occur
in the event of failure. The assessment has used a range of
evidence, including latest Environment Agency (EA) hydraulic
models and flood maps as well as data on sites that have
flooded in the past. The assessment has considered past
weather events and future climate change. The methodology
is described in Appendix 3 .
52 | Part B: Adaptation
Stakeholder voice
“Flooding was identified as one
of the impacts of climate
change that is most important
to prepare for during the
workshops. Of the 19 impacts
shown, those relating to
flooding (increased flooding of
homes and public services
being disrupted) were viewed
consistently as being both very
likely to occur in future and as
having a significant impact.”
A survey by Defra, 201318
We have identified a range of operational and capital solutions
to enhance the resilience of our most critical sites to the risk
of fluvial flooding. We have used the Cabinet Office model,
described above, to ensure a holistic, optimal approach. Capital
solutions are tailored to the individual asset and its specific
constraints, including measures such as raising control panels
above flood depths, installing flood proof doors and/or sealing
exterior cable entry holes. Operational response and recovery
plans are an important part of any solution because we
cannot protect every asset against every rainfall event. In some
cases, the emergency response plan is the only cost-beneficial
response. Telemetry and flood alarms will be central to our
response and recovery regime.
We have had to make some hard choices when prioritising our
investment to keep bills affordable in the current economic
climate. We are unable to include dedicated funding for
fluvial flood resilience solutions in our investment plan for
2015-2020. Our customers told us that they could not afford
this investment in the current economic climate. Instead, we
are looking to include flood resilience enhancements within
other projects where we can. We have been able to do so in
many recent projects, for example, we have raised essential
and vulnerable equipment at numerous sites where we have
been carrying out large projects to comply with new legislative
requirements for environmental water quality. In addition,
we will seek to implement further operational response and
recovery enhancements.
We will continue to develop our knowledge and monitor
external developments, for example in EA models which are
updated over time. We will use latest evidence to periodically
update our assessment to inform future planning. We
recognise that fluvial flood resilience is a growing risk due to
climate change and urban development, and therefore action
is a long-term priority.
One of our many treatment works
flooded in the 2007 floods
Reservoir resilience to heavy rainfall
Reservoirs present a risk to downstream communities
should they fail in a flood event. The Reservoir Safety Act and
Flood and Water Management Act requires that we effectively
manage this risk. We do this, for example, by careful and
robust design, extensive risk assessment, inspection regimes
and maintenance investment.
We will be enhancing our reservoirs’ resilience to flooding
by investing about £60 million in the period 2015-2020.
The majority of the investment will be used to maintain
reservoirs’ structural integrity and enhance their spillways
to ensure that excess water can bypass a reservoir without
harm. This is the second phase of a ten year programme
that started in 2010. We have already enhanced the spillways
and drawdown capability of a number of reservoirs.
Customer voice
“There is no choice, this
has got to happen and it
is a tiny amount to pay.”
A medium sized business customer, 201323
B5.3 Responding to
coastal erosion
Observations show that Yorkshire has the fastest eroding
coastline in Europe and the rate of erosion has increased in
recent years (Quinn et al, 200933). Climate change is expected
to increase this risk exposure as erosion rates are exacerbated
by higher sea levels and increasing storminess. We have worked
with Arup to complete an assessment of the risk from coastal
erosion. The process considered a range of available evidence,
observed data, historical maps and the National Coastal and
Erosion Risk Mapping (NCERM) dataset which accounts for
climate change. We have also consulted the relevant coastal
plans and policies such as Shoreline Management Plans. The
methodology is described in Appendix 3 .
53 | Part B: Adaptation
Damage caused to
a reservoir spillway
during an extreme
rainfall event
Our assessment has identified essential services that are at
risk from a number of assets becoming exposed to the sea in
the near future. Withernsea Waste water Treatment Works
(WwTW), three pumping stations and a section of water
main are all at risk in the short-term. We therefore need to
act, most probably by relocating these assets inland. Early
action is essential to secure the land, planning permission,
local consultation and discharge permit to allow the relocation
before the assets are lost to the sea.
We are discussing partnership opportunities with the EA and
local authorities where multiple benefits could be achieved by
working together to protect locations at risk. Our assessment
show that we have further assets at risk in the longer term,
so we will periodically review the latest data to inform future
planning needs.
B5.4 Planning for a coastal
storm surge
Storm surges are rare but can cause devastating coastal
flooding. The UK last experienced a storm surge in 1953
which caused over 300 deaths and widespread devastation to
people’s homes and businesses along the coastline of Anglia
and Yorkshire (Baxter, 200534). Our strategic climate change
risk assessment identified that our risk exposure will increase
over time as sea levels rise and storms increase in frequency
and severity, resulting in a greater risk of flood defences being
overwhelmed. The shape of the North Sea and the Humber
Estuary contribute to our storm surge vulnerability as surges
tend to ‘bounce’ around the North Sea and get channelled
up the funnel shaped Humber Estuary (Baxter, 200534).
The Cabinet Office suggests that a storm surge has between
a 1:20 and a 1:200 relative likelihood of occurring within the
next five years (The Cabinet Office, 201335). We worked with
JBA to undertake a provisional assessment of our risk. The
project used the coastal flooding outlines from EA flood maps
and combined these with sea level rise data from the 2009 UK
climate projections (UKCP09) to determine which assets are
at risk now and in the future. We identified over 250 assets at
potential risk. We will use the outputs from this initial screening
exercise to inform further assessment and our operational
response and recovery plans.
Many flood risk management authorities are involved
in preparing for a storm surge. We are supporting the
Humberside Local Resilience Forum who lead our region’s
response planning for coastal inundation.
Old Whittington treatment works
in the hard winter of 2009/10
B5.5 Enhancing our resilience
to extreme cold
Sub-zero temperatures, ice and snow can have an impact
upon operations and services, for example:
• Customer supply can be interrupted when the pipes on
their properties freeze if not effectively insulated. This
process can cause the customers’ pipes to burst, with
subsequent property damage when the pipe thaws.
• Pipe bursts and associated leakage, both from our pipes
and our customers’ pipes, can cause a sharp increase in
demand for water and a risk of interruption to water supply.
• Waste water treatment effectiveness can be reduced in
a number of ways. Bacteria used to break down waste
materials become less active in cold temperatures. Sludge
management equipment can freeze. Site access restrictions
can be caused by snow and ice can, for example, resulting
in the need to accumulate sludge stocks.
• Staff have to work in challenging conditions that present
health and safety concerns.
These issues were felt across the UK during the recent hard
winters of 2009/10 and 2010/11. We have since improved our
seasonal operational plans and enhanced the resilience of many
of our critical Water Treatment Works (WTW) with measures
such as trace heating and pipe lagging. We plan a small
programme of targeted winter protection measures to further
enhance the resilience of critical sites, focused on WwTW.
Our Winter Plan describes how we take a stepped approach
that escalates as necessary to ensure an effective operational
response. We monitor a series of weather and performance
indicators to inform our approach each winter. If a harsh winter
materialises we can implement a range of measures, such as
setting up an Incident Management Team, calling on additional
resources and staffing, and customer advice communications.
54 | Part B: Adaptation
We are taking a flexible and proportionate approach to
managing cold weather risks in the short-term because national
understanding is evolving on winter temperature projections.
The latest UK climate projections (UKCP09) find that sub-zero
temperatures will decrease, however more recent research has
found that progressive shrinking of Arctic sea ice is bringing
colder, snowier winters to the UK, Europe, North America and
China (Georgia Institute of Technology and Beijing Institute of
Atmospheric Physics, 201213). This is one of several recent studies
to find a relationship between Arctic ice and winter weather.
The research suggests that warming atmospheric temperatures
reduce the strength of the northern jet steam which normally
brings milder weather to Europe. We will monitor for new
evidence and use this to inform our long-term approach.
B5.6 Developing our knowledge
Our programme of research and investigations has been
instrumental in the development of our climate change risk
understanding. We have included a range of further weather
and climate change projects in our programme for the period
to 2020. For example we will consider the following projects:
• Our risk from landslips and how this is expected to
evolve in the changing climate.
• Quantifying how extreme rainfall return periods
are likely to change in Yorkshire.
• Quantifying our risk from sea level rise.
• Pluvial flood risk assessment, mirroring the approach
we took in our fluvial assessment.
Further information
More details can be found on our website
blueprintforyorkshire.com
B6: Keeping bills affordable
Section summary
• There will be a cost to maintain and enhance services in
the changing climate over the long-term. There are also
other long-term cost pressures, including for example,
population growth, the increasing cost of energy and
other finite resources, and an ageing infrastructure.
is most appropriate to take action over the long-term,
based on risk assessment that uses latest knowledge.
We anticipate that action will need to escalate over
time in response to worsening climate change. We will
strive to maximise the efficiency of our operations to
help mitigate increasing cost pressures, for example
through innovation.
• We already manage the cost of challenging extreme
weather events. For example, the floods of 2007 caused
us damage worth about £70 million, of which most but
not all was covered by insurance. The more we enhance
resilience, the lower the risk of unexpected costs like
these.
• To ensure the most cost-effective approach to
maintaining services we have a broad range of measures
outlined in this climate change strategy. We will keep
developing our strategy to determine when and how it
• We have taken some hard choices to prioritise our
most critical needs to ensure customer bills do not rise
above inflation to 2020. Our customers have told us that
affordability is a top priority in the current economic
climate. We will continue to work with our customers in
the future to determine the right balance between the
cost charged and the level of the service provided. We
offer a range of support options for those struggling to
pay their water bill.
Main climate change risks being addressed (full details in Appendix 1
2013: As we stand today
Risk title
Trend
2013
2080s
2020
2030s
2050s
2080s
Risk
understanding
2013
B1: Inability to
secure approval
Med
Med
B2: Affordability
Low
Low
Medium risk
2050s
2020: After our next
round of risk mitigation
2012
High risk
2030s
)
Low risk
Outcomes being supported
We provide you with water that is clean and safe to drink
We protect and improve the water environment
We keep your bills as low as possible
Progress measure for this theme of action
Measure:
Current performance:
Future target:
55 | Part B: Adaptation
Value for money (CC Water Annual Tracking survey) %
70% (2013/14)
Improvement from 2014/15 baseline, figure not yet available (2019/20)
Customer voice
Receiving high flows at
Blackburn Meadows
waste water treatment
works in Sheffield
It will be a challenge and a priority to ensure that customer’s
bills remain affordable as we respond to the increasing pressures
of climate change. The cost of climate change cannot be
considered in isolation because a variety of inter-related factors
combine to determine the total cost of providing our services,
for example, population growth, an aging infrastructure, new
legislative requirements and diminishing essential resources. We
manage this by being as efficient as we can to keep bills as low
as possible. We also offer a range of support services to those
customers that struggle to pay their bills.
We have taken hard choices in our Business Plan to ensure
that bills do not rise above inflation because affordability is
a real issue for some of our customers. The average household
bill will remain at £382 per annum between 2015-2020,
before inflation. We will invest £2.20 of the average annual
household bill to:
• Further reduce our leakage in response to the pressures
from climate change
• Encourage water efficiency by increasing the number of
households on water meters
• Manage sewer capacity issues and internal sewer flooding
• Supply services to new developments.
These are some examples of how we are responding to
population growth and climate change.
Bills would have been falling in real terms had it not been
for the need to meet the requirements of European legislation
to improve the environment.
B6.1 Efficiently managing the cost of
climate change and extreme weather
We manage costs from climate change and extreme
weather in two ways:
1. Managing the cost of maintaining services during
extreme weather events
We have managed the cost impacts of numerous recent weather
events, including floods, droughts and unusually cold winters.
For example, the floods of 2007 caused us damage worth
approximately £70 million. The weather does not have to be
notably extreme to impact on costs. Our typical £50 m annual
electricity bill can vary by up to £6 m depending on where and
when it rains in our region and therefore how much water and
waste water we need to pump.
56 | Part B: Adaptation
“Whatever the situation the
water companies have a
responsibility to provide an
excellent level of service,
that’s their job after all! It’s
what we all pay our bills for.”
A customer, 201219
We expect the cost of maintaining services to increase in
the future because climate projections suggest there will be
more frequent and more severe extreme weather events.
We are experienced at managing extreme weather events
efficiently and effectively. We ensure financial efficiency through
our extensive planning, emergency procedures and flexible
resource arrangements. We describe these plans and measures
throughout this strategy, particularly in section B5 .
We use insurance to help minimise our cost risk. For example,
much but not all of the costs incurred in the 2007 floods were
covered by our insurance. We have subsequently increased
our level of insurance cover to further enhance our resilience.
The more we can enhance our resilience, the lower the risk
of unexpected costs and service interruptions.
2. Managing the cost of enhancing resilience to weather
We invest in the most cost-effective way to maintain and
enhance our assets to ensure we can provide the levels of
service expected of us. We expect investment needs to grow
to maintain services as climate change has more severe impact
on weather patterns. For example, in our Water Resource
Management Plan we have determined the programme of
measures required to maintain the balance between water
supply and demand in the changing climate over the next
25 years. A diagram of our incremental response plan is
provided in section B2 .
We will minimise costs and the impact on customer bills by
ensuring the most cost-effective approach to any climate change
investment. We do this by assessing latest available knowledge
to determine when, where and how it is most appropriate to
take action. This is our standard practice for business planning
which has resulted in our current levels of resilience through
a measured, proportionate and considered approach. Where
we determine a priority need for action, we will select the best
possible solution by using Whole Life Cost assessment and by
considering traditional and innovative techniques.
For our Business Plan to 2020 we have prioritised programmes
of investment required for our most critical climate change
and extreme weather needs. These are described throughout
this strategy document. We will continue to work with
our customers in the future to determine the right balance
between cost and resilience of services.
B6.2 Supporting customers
that cannot afford to pay
We do all we can to ensure that customers’ bills are as low
as possible, but this alone does not protect those who are
most vulnerable. Our research found that 24% of households
in our region are in water poverty, spending more than 3%
of their disposable income on their water and waste water
bill (201217). We manage an affordability strategy which is
based on customer feedback and delivers the best overall
package of support, keeping bills at the lowest level possible
for all customers.
Some of the measures we take include:
• Knowing our customers: Data sharing helps us to
better understand our customers’ financial circumstances,
allowing us to target support to those who most need it.
• Flexible payment plans: We offer customers options
about how and when they pay.
• Budgeting advice: We work with different advisor groups
like the Citizens Advice Bureau to help and support
vulnerable customers and guide us in our approach.
• WaterSure: Is a government scheme that protects
metered customers with unavoidably high water use
by capping bills at the average bill value. It helps those
who are in receipt of benefits and have a large family
or relevant medical condition.
• Resolve: Is a scheme that offers low income customers
with high arrears a debt management process whereby
we write-off debt equivalent to that repaid.
• Community Trust: An independent charity which we
run to target customers with the greatest financial hardship
where no other scheme can help.
• Bad debt recovery: We estimated that non-payment
of bills cost each of our paying customers £11 in 2012.
We are recognised as an industry leader in debt recovery
and we work to differentiate between those who cannot
pay and those that will not pay.
• Social tariffs: The government published guidance
allowing companies to bring forward tariffs that permits
cross-subsidy between customers. Our research showed
customers were not convinced that social tariffs were
the most acceptable method of support. We continue to
monitor this position and are open to further debate.
Ultimately, we are regulated to deliver services to the
standards that our customers expect and are willing and able
to afford. We discuss this in more detail in section A1 . .
We would like national debate on climate change and the
long-term affordability of UK water and waste water services.
For example, we would like to work with the government,
regulators, other utilities and our customer representative
groups to consider:
• How is society best informed of the facts and risks
of climate change?
• What is the best way to consult customers on
these challenging issues?
• How will the industry ensure long-term affordability?
• What if customers cannot or do not want to pay
in the long-term?
• What consideration should we give future customers?
Further information
More details can be found on our website
blueprintforyorkshire.com
We have a variety
of measures to
help our customers
manage their bills
57 | Part B: Adaptation
Part C:
Mitigation
Reducing greenhouse gas
emissions to play our part in
minimising future climate change
We’re generating renewable energy from sewage
sludge and would like to do much more of this. These
tanks are digesting sludge to release methane gas
for energy and are part of our plan to create the first
large waste water treatment works in Europe that will
be self-sufficient for its substantial energy demand.
Introduction
We have been successful in delivering absolute emissions
reduction in recent years, despite numerous growth pressures.
Our success in achieving the Carbon Trust Standard and its
predecessor the Energy Efficiency Accreditation Scheme has
demonstrated our leading emissions reduction performance
through an independent verification process. In this part of
our strategy we examine how we will continue to deliver
emissions reduction, focusing on these themes:
C1: Understanding our emissions as an essential precursor
to their reduction.
C2: Minimising emissions from our use of electricity
delivers multiple economic, social and environmental benefits.
C3: Reducing our other operational emissions such as
those from fuels and transport, as part of our plan to pursue
every opportunity to minimise emissions.
C4: Managing our land with greenhouse gasses
in mind is important because we are a large landowner
with carbon-rich peat moorland and woodland.
59 | Part C: Mitigation
C5: Working in partnership with our supply chain
to maximise our influence on emissions reduction with
suppliers, delivery partners and customers.
We recognise that every individual can make a difference
and we have embarked on a cultural change programme
‘CO2llaborate to use less’. We are also engaging with our
customers to reduce the emissions produced when they
consume water and use the sewerage network. We
discuss these areas in section A2 .
Customer voice
Customer voice
In a recent national survey,
77% of people agreed that
“individuals and organisations
who contribute to climate
change should take on the
responsibility of dealing with
its consequences”.
“I think they should be
investing, yes, I do.”
“You’d hope they’re taking
the lead.”
Domestic customers, 201327
A survey by Ipsos Mori for Defra, 201318
C1: Understanding our emissions
Section summary
• Understanding greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions is
a precursor to their reduction. We have developed a
detailed understanding of our emissions. Electricity
is by far our largest source of operational emissions.
Emissions are also produced in our supply chain,
construction activities and by our customers’ use
of water for washing and heating.
• We have successfully reduced our operational
emissions since 2010. Our ability to secure the Carbon
Trust Standard demonstrates our strong performance.
• We will continue to monitor and develop
understanding of our emissions.
Main climate change risks being addressed (full details in Appendix 1
2013: As we stand today
Risk title
Trend
2013
2080s
2020
2030s
2050s
2080s
Risk
understanding
2013
E3: Greenhouse
gas emissions
N/A
High
B2: Affordability
Low
Low
Medium risk
2050s
2020: After our next
round of risk mitigation
2012
High risk
2030s
)
Low risk
Outcomes being supported
We understand our impact on the wider environment and act responsibly
We keep your bills as low as possible
Progress measure for this theme of action
Measure:
Current performance:
Future target:
60 | Part C: Mitigation
The maturity of our GHG accounting
Mature operational accounting and developing embodied accounting
Continual improvement in GHG accounting scope and confidence
We recognise that understanding emissions is an essential
precursor to their effective reduction.
We have developed a detailed understanding of the emissions
we produce during our activities to provide water and waste
water services. We call these our operational emissions. This is
where we have focused our efforts because it is here that we
are able to ensure emissions reduction. We have measured and
published most of our carbon footprint annually since 2004,
continually improving our approach each year.
The nature of our operational carbon footprint for 2012/13
is shown in the pie chart below. Electricity dominates because
the treatment and distribution of water and waste water
requires large amounts of energy. Our second largest source
of emissions are process emissions. These are produced during
the treatment of water, waste water and sewage sludge.
The relative proportion of operational,
supply chain and customer emissions
Supply
Chain
310 KtCO2e
Customer
1814 KtCO2e
Operational
386 KtCO2e
Operational carbon footprint for 2012/13
Gas oil
Transport
Other
Process
emissions
In addition to those emissions in our operational activities,
more are produced up and down the supply chain of our
services. Embodied emissions result from the production
and transport of the things we buy and build to maintain
and enhance our water and waste water services. Customers’
end use of water also results in emissions, for example when
water is used for heating and washing. The diagram shows
the relative proportion of operational, supply chain and
customer emissions.
Our land also has an important role in emissions management.
As a large landowner we manage carbon-rich peat moorland
and woodland. Our research shows our moorland currently
absorbs more emissions than it produces, thereby helping
minimise future climate change. This is a priority because land
management practices can enhance or deteriorate this climate
change mitigation function.
We discuss how we are managing all sources of emissions
associated with our assets and services throughout the rest
of part C of this strategy, and also in section A2 . In
section C2 we examine our recent operational emissions
and future scenarios.
Electricity
We have delivered an 8% reduction in our operational emissions
since 2010/11. This has enabled us to secure the Carbon Trust
Standard. Our operational carbon footprint was 386 KtCO2e
(kilo tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent) in 2012/13. This is the
equivalent of driving nearly 120 million miles in an average petrol
car, enough to drive to the moon and back 250 times.
Generating energy
with a hydro turbine
at Esholt waste water
treatment works
61 | Part C: Mitigation
We will continue to monitor and publish our operational
emissions footprint and we will use this data to prioritise our
resources to deliver emissions reduction. We continue to
develop our accounting methodologies for embodied emissions
and how we use these to inform our planning. One of our
priorities is to further research the emissions associated with
treatment processes, supply chain and customers use of water.
A colleague optimises
one of our energy
generation facilities
C2: Minimising emissions from our use of electricity
Section summary
• Electricity presents one of our greatest opportunities
to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions because
it accounts for about three quarters of our operational
emissions. Our objective is to minimise emissions in
the most efficient way available.
• We have been successful in delivering emissions reduction
by being more efficient in our use of electricity and by
increasing our own renewable electricity generation.
• National grid decarbonisation will help us halve our
operational emissions by 2030 if government plans are
achieved (DECC, 201337). This is despite several pressures
that are expected to increase our electricity demand.
The decarbonisation will come at a substantial cost in
growing electricity bills and carbon taxes.
• We have many cost-effective electricity efficiency
and generation schemes that would help to minimise
the cost impact on our customers’ bills and maximise
our ability to reduce emissions, beyond those achieved
through grid decarbonisation alone. Our customers
told us they could not afford the required upfront capital
outlay in the current economic climate. Instead, we
will seek alternative sources of funding to further our
emissions reduction. We will continue to engage with
our customers about future options.
• Stronger legislative and regulatory incentives would
help us maximise the benefit we can provide to society
through carbon reduction. For example, we would
welcome increased financial support and/or statutory
water industry targets for renewable energy generation.
Main climate change risks being addressed (full details in Appendix 1
2013: As we stand today
Risk title
Trend
2013
2080s
2020
2030s
2050s
2080s
Risk
understanding
2013
E3: Greenhouse
gas emissions
N/A
High
CS12: Resilient
supply chain,
including grid
electricity
Low
Low
CS13: Resilient
energy selfgeneration
Low
Low
B2: Affordability
Low
Low
Medium risk
2050s
2020: After our next
round of risk mitigation
2012
High risk
2030s
)
Low risk
Outcomes being supported
We understand our impact on the wider environment and act responsibly
We keep your bills as low as possible
Progress measure for this theme of action
Measure:
Current performance:
Future target:
62 | Part C: Mitigation
Total GHG emissions from our electricity consumption (KtCO2e)
292 KtCO2e (2012/13)
To maximise our cost-effective potential for efficiency and generation
The UK water industry is the fourth most energy intensive
sector in the UK and contributes to just under 1% of total
UK emissions (Council for science and technology, 200937).
It takes a large amount of electricity to run an organisation
as big as ours, some 595 GWh each year. This is our third
largest operating cost and rising. Our electricity use results
in approximately 75% of our operational emissions. We have
three main drivers that require us to focus on our electricity
consumption and emissions:
Stakeholder voice
“Energy consumption,
reducing process emissions
and transport efficiency should
be considered alongside
other aspects of sustainable
development in delivering
any particular outcome.”
1. The high and increasing cost of electricity from growth
in wholesale prices, network charges and 18 financial
incentives like the Carbon Reduction Commitment Energy
Efficiency Scheme (CRC) and Climate Change Levy. The cost
of electricity threatens the affordability of water bills for our
customers.
Defra, 201214
2. A continuing long-term trend of increasing electricity
consumption, caused by:
New environmental water quality legislation –
It is expected that our electricity consumption will
increase by approximately 30 GWh (5%) per annum
as a result of the investment we will make to comply
with new legislation like the Water Framework Directive
in the period 2015-2020.
We respond to these business risks and opportunities by
minimising the electricity we need and maximising our ability
to generate our own low-carbon electricity. This approach
helps us to reduce our emissions and keep our costs low too.
Population growth – Our planning forecasts show we
can expect approximately 855,000 more people needing
water and waste water services in our region by 2040.
C2.1 Minimising our use
of electricity
“Private to Public” sewer transfer – In 2011 we became
responsible for 22,000 km of private sewers and lateral
drains that had previously belonged to our customers,
almost doubling the size of our sewer system. By 2016 we
will also take responsibility for about 720 private pumping
stations. Our initial estimates suggest this will increase our
electricity consumption by 14 GWh per annum or 2.5%.
Efficient use of electricity guarantees many financial, environmental
and social benefits. We have made great strides in recent years,
successfully reducing our total electricity consumption by 5.3%
since 2010/11. This follows 20 years of growth in electricity demand
since privatisation, driven primarily by investment to meet new
legislation for environmental water quality.
Climate change – We expect the changing weather
to drive an increase in our electricity consumption.
Where and when it rains in our region can influence
our typical £50 million annual electricity bill by up to
£6 million because it affects how we need to treat and
pump water and waste water.
We are investing over £18 million between 2010 and 2015 to
further reduce our electricity use by approximately 36 GWh,
which is 6% of current consumption. We forecast an increasing
demand to meet the numerous pressures outlined above. The
graph above shows our past and future forecast electricity
demand if there is no further efficiency investment.
3. The opportunity to offset growing cost and emissions
by using government incentives such as the Renewables
Obligation and Feed-in Tariffs (FiTs) to generate our own
low-carbon electricity.
In practice we want to continue to reduce our electricity
demand. We will achieve further efficiency through a
combination of capital investment, improved operations and
a culture of increased focus right across our business.
Our past and projected electricity demand
Electricity consumption, GWh
1,000
800
600
400
200
63 | Part C: Mitigation
29/30
27/28
28/29
25/26
26/27
23/24
24/25
21/22
22/23
19/20
20/21
17/18
18/19
16/17
15/16
13/14
14/15
11/12
12/13
10/11
09/10
07/08
08/09
06/07
05/06
03/04
04/05
01/02
02/03
00/01
99/00
97/98
98/99
96/97
95/96
93/94
94/95
91/92
92/93
90/91
0
Below we provide some examples of ongoing and potential
future activities to further reduce our electricity consumption:
• Asset efficiency on electricity-intensive equipment
like pumps, motors and gearboxes. For example we are
going to save £50,000 per year on our electricity bill
by refurbishing the pumps at Brayton Water Pumping
Station and by installing an automated control system.
• Asset design for the lowest Whole Life Cost ensures new
or refurbished equipment has the best balance between
the cost of upfront investment and ongoing operational
costs like electricity. For example at Blackburn Meadows
Waste water Treatment Works (WwTW) we have installed
higher efficiency aeration blowers which over the span of
its life will save around £0.6 million. We discuss asset design
in more detail in section C5 .
• Monitoring has been enhanced by the introduction of
Automatic Meter Readers (AMR) on the vast majority of our
supplies, and sub-meters on the most electricity-intensive
equipment. Granular, almost-live data greatly improves our
ability to target intervention quickly and accurately.
• Control and automation technologies allow regular,
instant and optimised process management. For example,
water pumping is one of largest electricity consuming
activities and we are using our real time systems to optimise
their operation and maximise electricity efficiency.
• Training and culture to inform and engage colleagues
in climate change issues, at home and in the work place.
Our “CO2llaborate to use less” programme has generated
ideas, built advocacy and delivered electricity efficiency and
emissions reduction across all parts of our business.
The programme will evolve over time and is currently moving
into a phase of detailed technical training for those colleagues
who are in roles most able to deliver electricity efficiency. We
discuss training and culture in more detail in section A4 .
• Governance and reporting makes our electricity
performance visible to inform decision making. For
example a central Energy and Recycling Team maximises
operational efficiency, implements opportunities and
fosters the right culture.
We also reduce emissions by managing exactly when we use
electricity. We and other large electricity users can help national
electricity generators at peak times by using less or supplying to
the grid the renewable electricity we produce. This helps national
generators avoid switching on extra capacity which is inefficient.
We have been trialling techniques and are increasingly effective
at reacting when we receive notice of peak demands. We will
continue to focus on avoiding peak demand to reduce cost and
emissions and contribute to regional energy management.
C2.2 Maximising our generation
of low-carbon electricity
We have invested tens of millions of pounds over the last
decade to generate renewable electricity. Currently we generate
about 7% of our electricity needs from a range of renewable
sources. By 2015 we will have increased this to around 12%. The
diagram shows our renewable electricity facilities and current
developments. To date our expenditure has been on the most
cost-effective schemes, funded through customer bills and
reinvestment from our profits. Our objective has been to costeffectively meet our own operational needs, thereby keeping
our customers’ bills low and stable, reducing our environmental
impact, and improving the resilience of our services.
Our current renewable energy facilities and developments
64 | Part C: Mitigation
We are consulting with communities about wind
farm developments that will have strong benefits
for customers’ bills and the environment
Here is a summary of our facilities and short-term plans:
• Sewage sludge digestion is our largest source of electricity
generation. Our approach is helping to create a sustainable
closed-loop waste water treatment operation. This has
multiple benefits including reducing GHG emissions and
protecting customer bills from volatile and rising electricity
prices. In addition to refurbishing our existing digesters to
maintain their electricity generation performance, we are
also investing in new capacity sufficient to let us close two
of our four energy intensive sludge incinerators. Current
developments include:
– A Thermal Hydrolysis Plant (THP) is being installed at
Esholt WwTW which serves the population of Bradford.
The THP will work alongside our existing anaerobic
digester plant at the site. This will help us to increase the
throughput of sludge at the plant, maximise the electricity
we are able to generate from biogas, and produce an
enhanced end-product which can be used by farmers as a
fertiliser. By 2015 we are planning to make Esholt the first
large European WwTW that is electricity self-sufficient.
– The construction of a large new digestion facility at
Blackburn Meadows WwTW in Sheffield.
Customer voice
“Greener energy production
and using waste within any
industry to generate its
own energy is a positive.”
A medium sized business customer, 201323
Customer voice
“…once they are producing
their own energy, the long-term
bills will be reduced.”
A small sized business customer, 201323
• Wind turbines are operational at two sites housed
on large treatment works at Hull and Loftsome Bridge.
We are working in partnership with our sister company
Kelda Water Services (KWS) to construct a new turbine at
Knostrop WwTW, located in an industrial area of Leeds.
The Knostrop turbine will generate up to 3.7 GWh/year for
use by Yorkshire Water. We are also working in partnership
to progress a number of potential wind developments at
various stages of feasibility and planning application. In
total, we have identified new turbine developments that
could generate about 30% of our demand. We recognise
public concerns about the potential aesthetic impact of
wind turbines and discuss our new approach below.
• Hydro generation performance has grown by 28%
since 2010. We now have six operational sites that provide
4 GWh which is approximately 1% of current demand.
• Solar power is not in our current portfolio. We have
recently identified nine suitable sites that could yield
14.5 GWh which is 2.5% of current demand.
Purchasing third party renewable energy
– We are working in partnership to innovate new technologies
that maximise the electricity we can generate from sewage
sludge. We aspire to deliver a step change in the energy
generation capability of current digestion technologies.
We have various projects at different stages of innovation
and will use the results to inform our future approach to
managing sludge and sourcing our electricity.
65 | Part C: Mitigation
In the short-term, we cannot meet all of our electricity
needs through our own renewable generation. The upfront
investment needs to be spread over time if it is to be affordable,
and further technological development is required. To minimise
our environmental impact and support the growing green
economy, we are investigating the potential to cost-effectively
procure low-carbon electricity from third parties. To date we
have not found a cost-effective supplier but the market is
evolving rapidly and we will continue to monitor the options.
Choosing wind turbine locations with care
We are considering various locations that we feel are appropriate
for wind development and which will deliver multiple benefits
for customers and the environment. While some people are
pleased to see local and renewable developments, we respect
that others perceive aesthetic and noise impacts. We follow
industry best practice and recognise the need to be sensitive to
the wishes of the local community.
We draw distinction between two approaches:
1. Turbines on our operational sites to help meet the
electricity needs of those sites. These sites can have notably
less negative impact where they are located in industrial
areas. We will continue to prioritise operational sites for new
turbines. We recognise that this approach alone can only
make a small contribution to our large electricity demand.
2. Wind farms which would be remote from our sites but
still providing electricity to cost-effectively support the
needs of our operations. We have no operational wind
farm sites currently. We are progressing designs and
planning applications for a number of sites we feel could
be appropriate for wind development.
For new developments we will implement a three point
approach to ensure the right balance between those that
perceive aesthetic impact and the many wider benefits:
1. Greater pre-planning engagement with local communities
2. More listening to customer feedback and openness to
adapting our plans
3. Considering how best to share the gains and invest them
in local communities.
We will use renewable energy when...
C2.3 Our long-term plans
We want to play our part in reducing future climate change
by maximising our strong potential for efficient and effective
emissions reduction. The line graph below shows our recent
operational emissions and three future scenarios.
National grid decarbonisation will help us halve our operational
emissions by about 2030 if government plans are achieved
(DECC, 201337). This is likely to be the minimum emissions
reduction we can achieve. However, this is entirely reliant
on the government and the energy sector, and emissions
reduction will come at a substantial cost in growing electricity
bills and carbon taxes.
We see great value in going further than national grid
decarbonisation and we have many electricity efficiency and
generation schemes that would help us minimise this cost
impact and keep customers bills low in the long-term. In our
second scenario we consider our emissions trajectory if we
pursue the most cost-effective schemes and mature renewable
technologies. Our customers have told us they are unable
to fund the required upfront capital outlay in the current
economic climate. Instead, we plan to deliver this scenario if we
can find alternative sources of funding. We will also continue to
engage with our customers about future options.
We are pursuing a range of energy generation innovations.
If everything we are currently pursuing is successful we could
save around 1,600 KtCO2e by 2035, in addition to that which
grid decarbonisation will deliver. This is equivalent to over four
years of our current operational emissions, or nearly five billion
miles in an average petrol car. The options will also contribute
to electricity security by using less and providing local and
domestic generation capabilities. This is our best case scenario
and we are committed to our continued innovation in energy
efficiency and generation.
Stronger legislative and regulatory incentives would help us
maximise the benefit we can provide society through carbon
reduction. For example, we would welcome increased financial
support and/or statutory water industry targets for renewable
energy generation.
...it’s right for our land
and our assets
...customers and
stakeholders support it
...there’s a return for
our investors
...it reduces our
Whole Life
Costs
Customer voice
“Yes I do think that the
water company should
be reducing its impact on
climate change but at the
present time I don’t think
it will happen because
nobody has the money
to pay for it.”
A domestic customer, 201219
66 | Part C: Mitigation
Recent reduction despite
numerous upward pressures
and annual variability caused
by the weather.
Forecast to 2020 based
on the impacts of our Business
Plan. Reduction achieved primarily
through grid decarbonisation.
Scenario 1: National grid
decarbonisation will help us
halve our operational emissions
by about 2030 if government
plans are achieved (DECC,
201337). This will come at a
substantial cost in our growing
energy bills and carbon taxes.
Options for our future
operational emissions
450
400
350
KtCO2e
300
250
200
150
100
50
0
0
20
10
9/
5
3
0
4
9
3
1
5
4
7
6
1
0
2
2
8
9
5
7
6
3
4
8
/3
/2
/3
/2
/3
/2
/2
/2
/3
/2
/3
/2
/1
/1
/1
/11 1/12
/1
/2
/3
/1
/2
/1
/2
/1
29
30
34
31
33
23
28
27
22
26
24
20
21
32
25
1
12
10
16
18
13
19
15
17
14
20
20
20
20
20
20
20
20
20
20
20
20
20
20
20
20
20
20
20
20
20
20
20
20
20
Scenario 2: Delivering our
cost-effective and technically
feasible schemes for electricity
efficiency and renewable
generation would help us mitigate
the cost of, and go further than,
national grid decarbonisation.
The cost of this scenario is
cheaper than scenario 1 over the
long-term. We have not funded
the required investment in our
Business Plan for 2015-2020
because our customers told us
they could not afford the upfront
outlay. Instead we have assumed
we can secure alternative funding
before 2020.
67 | Part C: Mitigation
Scenario 3: Delivering our
‘lower confidence’ schemes
for electricity efficiency and
renewable generation could take
us a long way towards carbonneutral operations. These schemes
are lower confidence because
they involve techniques yet to
be proven and/or not yet costeffective. For this scenario we have
assumed we will be able to secure
alternative funding before 2020
and that our current innovations
deliver as expected.
1,600 KtCO2e opportunity
for cost-effective additional
emissions reduction by about
2035, over and above national
grid decarbonisation. This is over
four years’ worth of our current
operational emissions.
C3: Reducing our other operational emissions
Section summary
• This is enabling us to close our incinerators, which
consume large amounts of gas oil. We are monitoring
our process emissions and further research and
innovation is a priority.
• No source of our greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions can
be ignored if we are to meet the levels of reduction
needed to effectively curb future climate change.
• Treatment processes are our second biggest source of
operational emissions, after electricity. We are capturing
and harnessing the emissions released from sewage
sludge to create energy.
• The maintenance of our infrastructure and the delivery
of our services requires a lot of travel. We seek to reduce
the amount we travel and the impact when we do.
Main climate change risks being addressed (full details in Appendix 1
2020: After our next
round of risk mitigation
2013: As we stand today
Risk title
Trend
2013
2013
E3: Greenhouse
gas emissions
N/A
High
CS12: Resilient
supply chain,
including grid
electricity
Low
Low
Medium risk
2050s
2080s
2020
2030s
2050s
2080s
Risk
understanding
2012
High risk
2030s
)
Low risk
Outcomes being supported
We understand our impact on the wider environment and act responsibly
We keep your bills as low as possible
Progress measure for this theme of action
Measure:
Current performance:
Future target:
Operational GHG emissions excluding electricity (KtCO2e)
94 KtCO2e (2012/13)
Continual improvement to cost-effectively minimise
emissions wherever we can
Electricity accounts for approximately 75% of our operational
emissions, as we describe in section C2 . Here we describe
how we seek to address every other source of our operational
emissions because nothing can be ignored if we are to
meet the widely recognised target for 80% reduction by
2050. Climate scientists suggest this is the level necessary to
hold global climate change at manageable levels (European
Commission, 200738) and the UK government have legislated
for the country to meet this target in the Climate Change Act
(2008). We theme our remaining emissions sources as follows:
• Process emissions account for approximately 16% of
our operational carbon footprint. This includes emissions
released during the treatment of water, waste water and
sewage sludge.
• Transport contributes about 4% of our operational emissions.
• Fuels and other sources make up the remaining 4%
of our emissions.
68 | Part C: Mitigation
Stakeholder voice
“Energy consumption,
reducing process emissions
and transport efficiency
should be considered alongside
other aspects of sustainable
development in delivering any
particular outcome.”
Defra, 201214
C3.1 Reducing our process
emissions
Minimising our travel
Emissions are directly released during waste water and
sewage sludge treatment processes. Emissions are a natural
by-product of the biological treatment processes used to
break down organic matter in sewage to make it safe for
return to the environment. A small amount of emissions are
also produced in water treatment processes. These process
emissions can also be known as fugitive emissions.
We described in section C2 how we are increasing
our capacity to digest sewage sludge to create affordable,
low-carbon renewable electricity to power our operations.
The emissions of such electricity are notably lower than the
current national grid average. There is a further climate change
mitigation benefit because these digestion activities contain
and harness the fugitive GHG emissions in sewage sludge to
create energy. By increasing our sludge digestion capability we
are also able to close our incinerators which use large amounts
of gas oil. This is a more sustainable approach because it
turns a waste into a valuable, renewable product. We want to
further expand our digestion capacity.
We also recycle sewage sludge to farmland and reclamation
sites to provide a more sustainable alternative to petrochemical
fertilisers and peat composts. Sewage sludge is high in
nutrients and can safely be recycled to land after carefully
controlled treatment processes.
We will monitor our process emissions and consider how we
can best take further action to manage them. Research and
innovation are a priority in this area.
Our process emissions
• Video-conferencing facilities have been installed on all
personal computers and in the majority of meetings rooms.
Since the facilities were introduced in April 2012 we estimate
that over 70,000 business miles have been avoided.
• New office locations have been chosen with transport links
in mind. Our Asset Delivery Unit has located near the centre
of Leeds to be near excellent public transport options. Other
latest operational offices have been located next to excellent
motorway links to avoid unnecessary inner city travel.
Reducing the impact when we do travel
• Efficient vehicles are used by regularly replacing our cars
and vans. Our company car fleet currently has average
GHG emissions of 121 g/km which is below the national
average of 126 g/km (The Association of Fleet Operations,
201339). The average emissions of our order book stands at
117 g/km and we are considering introducing a 130 g/km
cap on all company cars.
• Training on driving safety and efficiency is undertaken
by many colleagues.
• Electric vehicles are being monitored for their viability in our
business. We have been trialling electric vehicles and have
installed an electric car charging point at our head office.
• Public transport and lift-sharing is encouraged with
discounted season tickets, a lift-share database and
bike-to-work scheme.
80,000
70,000
We will continue to drive a range of initiatives to reduce the
amount we travel and reduce the impact when we do travel.
We have set ourselves a target to reduce business emissions
by 20% between 2012/13 and 2017/18.
60,000
Tonnes CO2e
• Remote working technologies are widely used across
our operations. Our operators and managers can monitor
and control assets anywhere, anytime on their laptops and
from our regional control centre. Remote working for our
office staff is also encouraged where appropriate for the
role, with hot-desking facilities at various locations and
remote access technologies. As well as reducing the need
to travel, these facilities also enhance our resilience.
50,000
40,000
30,000
C3.3 Reducing our fuels and
other sources of emissions
20,000
10,000
0
2009 / 10
Sludge incineration
2010 / 11
Sludge digestion
2011 / 12
Treatment processes
2012 / 13
Sludge recycling to land
C3.2 Reducing our transport
emissions
Travel is an essential part of our business because we are a
regional company that needs to visit homes, businesses and
our thousands of sites. Tankering of water and sewage sludge
is a large source of our transport emissions. We also manage
a large fleet of cars and vans to support our operations,
such as meter readings, site maintenance and movements
between offices. Our operational needs challenge our ability
to reduce our transport emissions. We are tackling this
challenge through a range of initiatives and plans to minimise
the amount of travel we undertake and reduce the impact of
the travel we do need to undertake.
69 | Part C: Mitigation
We have a range of relatively small emissions sources that
together make up about 4% of our operational carbon
footprint. This includes, for example:
• Fuel oils for generators and incinerators.
• Natural gas, LPG and kerosene for heating and cooking.
• Refrigerant gasses for air conditioning.
In our continual drive for financial and GHG efficiency we
identify opportunities to reduce these emissions. For example
we have closed a large sewage sludge drying facility at our
Hull Waste water Treatment Works because it had become
old and inefficient. This operation was one of our largest
users of natural gas. We have a programme to maintain and
modernise our offices and main operational buildings. This
includes activities like increasing insulation, replacing old boilers
and introducing modern temperature control systems.
C4: Managing our land with greenhouse gasses in mind
Section summary
• We were pleased to support the government’s climate
change advisors, the Adaptation Sub-Committee
(ASC), in their recent work. We support their three
recommendations to government: “(i) set an explicit policy
goal to increase the area under restoration, (ii) review
the enforcement of current regulations, and (iii) improve
incentives for landowners to invest in restoration” (20134).
• Land management practices affect the amount of carbon
released from peat and soils, directly contributing to
climate change and water quality. Greenhouse gasses
(GHG) are also released in the additional chemicals,
electricity and waste involved in treating poor quality
water to make it safe and wholesome for customers.
• We have developed innovative approaches and worked
in partnership to improve the management of our own
and other people’s land. Our approach is delivering
multiple benefits, including for example: water quality,
climate change, biodiversity and recreation.
• We are managing our existing woodland sustainably.
We have not been able to make the case for new
woodland because of insufficient cost-benefit.
We remain open to discussion and seek stronger
incentives from policy makers for new woodland.
Main climate change risks being addressed (full details in Appendix 1
2013: As we stand today
Risk title
Trend
2013
2080s
2020
2030s
2050s
2080s
Risk
understanding
2013
WQ1: Land
management
Low
Med
E3: Greenhouse
gas emissions
N/A
High
B2: Affordability
Low
Low
Medium risk
2050s
2020: After our next
round of risk mitigation
2012
High risk
2030s
)
Low risk
Outcomes being supported
We provide you with water that is clean and safe to drink
We protect and improve the water environment
We understand our impact on the wider environment and act responsibly
We keep your bills as low as possible
Progress measure for this theme of action
Measure:
The amount of land we conserve and enhance, hectares
Current performance: 13,564 hectares (2014/15)
Future target:
16,349 hectares (2019/20)
70 | Part C: Mitigation
Eroded peat moorland
on Wessenden Moor
Stakeholder voice
“Companies should consider
how biological carbon
sequestration could contribute
towards emissions reduction
targets with consideration
being given to woodland...,
management of peat moorland
and organic soils...”
Our water quality objective aligns with climate change
mitigation objectives by:
• Helping avoid the additional GHG emitted from the extra
electricity, chemicals and treatment processes needed to
clean poor quality water that is polluted by inappropriate
land management practices; and,
• Slowing, and potentially reversing, the direct contribution to
climate change that land has when dissolved organic carbon
(DOC) is eroded from bare peat and soil. Climate change
could accelerate peat moorland deterioration to the extent
of a three-fold increase in the rate of carbon loss (ASC,
20134). The climate change impact is compounded because
the DOC is itself a cause of poor water quality that needs
extra electricity, chemicals and GHG emissions used in the
additional treatment required to remove colour.
Defra, 201214
C4.1 Managing peat moorland
for maximum benefit
We are one of the largest landowners in Yorkshire, with
approximately 29,000 hectares of land. This land includes land
rented by farmers, moorland peat, woodland of mixed age
and species, and reservoirs. Our land holdings and
management practices are an important part of our climate
change strategy for a number of reasons. From a climate
change mitigation perspective, land stores significant amounts
of carbon, especially peat moorland. Land management
practices can either release stored carbon and contribute
to climate change and water quality issues, or lock away
emissions and help avoid such problems. Carbon storage
is also termed ‘sequestration’. Land management is also
important from a climate change adaptation perspective,
as we outline in section B1 and section B4 .
As a water company we have managed our land and worked
with other landowners for many years with the primary goal
of protecting water quality, but also recognising many other
benefits such as biodiversity, landscape and recreation.
71 | Part C: Mitigation
Peat is particularly important for GHG management because
of the huge quantities of carbon that have been locked
away over thousands of years. Peat moorlands hold the UK`s
largest single store of carbon (Defra, 201040). Yorkshire is
strategically important on this issue because our region holds
a large proportion of the UK’s peat moorland habitat. We
have a leading role because we are a large landowner of peat
moorlands and this is the source for much of our drinking water.
Our modelling with Durham and Leeds Universities (Yorkshire
Water, 201041) found that our peat moorland is currently a net
sink of 10.7 KtCO2e/yr (kilotonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent
per year), and this could increase to 19.5 KtCO2e/yr with targeted
management. For comparison, our annual operational GHG
emissions were 386 KtCO2e in 2012/13. However, climate change
and other pressures are damaging the peat moorland and causing
carbon loss. Our research concluded that the most efficient
strategy for carbon benefit is the re-vegetation of bare peat to
help prevent erosion when it rains. Bare peat can be caused by
deliberate and wild fires, air pollution, drainage and over-grazing.
We manage 2,000
hectares of woodland,
mainly at our reservoirs
C4.2 Managing woodland for
maximum benefit
The government is increasingly encouraging woodland creation
and management because of the many associated benefits.
From a climate change mitigation perspective, woodland can
provide GHG storage and a sustainable source of energy.
While we recognise there are many benefits in well-managed
woodland, we are cautious about investing in new plantations
because we have not found a firm business case to date. The
cost-benefit remains unclear and the current costs of managing
our forests are greater than the value of timber we obtain from
them. There is inherent uncertainty in relying on a financial or
environmental return from woodland that takes many decades
to mature and which is itself under increasing pressures from
climate change.
Our approach to catchment management supports the objective
of the Climate Change Act (2008) to reduce emissions. Our work
has delivered extensive industry-leading research, monitoring
and trials. Over the last five years we have successfully moved
catchment management into practical delivery as an important
part of our approach to water quality management. Our past
and future catchment management has, and will continue, to be
focused on the maintenance and restoration of Yorkshire’s peat
moorlands and other protected habitats, both on our own land
and working in partnership with other landowners such as the
National Trust. Our work will help to keep existing carbon locked
away and hopefully even start to grow the carbon store. We will
also continue our monitoring and research to further knowledge
of the multiple benefits and to optimise techniques in practice.
We have quantified the many benefits delivered by a
healthy peat moorland, such as cleaner raw water quality
and healthier biodiversity. We found that £2.96 worth of
benefits to society (or ‘ecosystem services’) can be delivered
for each £1 invested in habitat restoration and protection.
Whereas for every £1 not invested, society can lose £2.57
worth of benefits (Natural England, 201242). It is likely that
the cost-benefit is actually greater than these figures suggest
as the project was not able to include for the value of other
benefits. The ASC (20134) said in their recent progress report
to government: “There is an economic case for peatland
restoration. The case becomes even stronger when risks
associated with climate change are taken into account.”
We welcomed the opportunity to support the ASC’s latest
progress report by sharing our knowledge and demonstrating
catchment management in practice at a site visit to Keighley
Moor in March 2013.
Our recent activities and future plans are described in more
detail in section B1 .
We currently manage around 2,000 hectares of woodland,
much of which is single age conifer planted in blocks between
1950-1980 with the primary purpose of timber creation. Today,
our primary purpose in managing woodland is to protect
raw water quality while also delivering other benefits such as
biodiversity and recreation. The wood we produce through
our maintenance operations is sold for a variety of external
uses, including renewable energy. Our sustainable approach to
woodland management is independently verified to the FSC
Standard (Forestry Stewardship Council) and we follow the
UK Woodland Assurance Standard (UKWAS) and associated
guidelines which reflect internationally recognised best practice.
Our plans for the short- and medium-term continue to be
focused on the management of the woodland we already
own, and therefore retaining the current GHG store. By 2020
we will complete a 10 year programme to restore 150 hectares
of ancient woodland. We manage our ancient woodland for
biodiversity through replanting and retention of trees and
shrubs that are native to that woodland type. Within our other
woodland holdings we are increasing age and species diversity,
to reduce the adverse impact of extreme weather as well as
pests and diseases. We also plan to investigate the location
and health of veteran trees on our land, and take measures to
secure their survival. We are managing resilient woodlands in
line with government guidance.
In considering new plantations, we have found that traditional
cost-benefit assessment shows an unclear case, even when
including available subsidies. However, we recognise that
there are many non-financial benefits in woodland, including
for example: protecting raw water quality, GHG storage,
enhancing biodiversity and providing recreational and amenity
benefits. Therefore, further investigation is needed to fully
understand the value of these ecosystem services and the
potential to reduce GHG emissions, as well as the associated
incentives and risks. The Water Framework Directive may offer
a new driver to plant new woodland to benefit water quality
and/or flood risk.
We remain open to discussion about planting new woodland
and will be seeking to work in partnership with others to play
our part in this process. We would welcome stronger incentives
from policy makers to encourage further focus on woodland
and their many benefits.
72 | Part C: Mitigation
We and the Yorkshire Wildlife Trust demonstrate the
success of our catchment management partnership
to the Committee on Climate Change, Defra, Ofwat
and Natural England. We have blocked the drain to
hold back water, preventing erosion and allowing
‘Sphagnum’ to grow and create new peat.
In order to enhance the national
approach to moorland peat
restoration, we support the
Adaptation Sub-Committee’s
three recommendations to
government: “(i) set an explicit
policy goal to increase the area
under restoration, (ii) review the
enforcement of current
regulations, and (iii) improve
incentives for landowners to
invest in restoration”.
Adaptation Sub-Committee, 20134
We are working with our delivery partners to reduce the
emissions embedded in the things we build. This image is
showing an example of the additional sewer storage capacity
we have built to prevent flooding and pollution.
C5: Working in partnership with our supply chain
Section summary
• There are large greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions ‘embodied’
in our extensive supply chain. We are reducing these
emissions by ensuring GHG is effectively considered in the
design and build of new assets and infrastructure, and in the
purchasing of goods, materials and services.
• GHG emissions are one of the factors included in
our investment planning decisions. We will be
incentivising our designers and engineers to identify
efficiencies to minimise this impact.
Main climate change risks being addressed (full details in Appendix 1
2020: After our next
round of risk mitigation
2013: As we stand today
Risk title
Trend
2013
2013
E3: Greenhouse
gas emissions
N/A
High
CS12: Resilient
supply chain,
including grid
electricity
Low
Low
Medium risk
2050s
2080s
2020
2030s
2050s
2080s
Risk
understanding
2012
High risk
2030s
)
Low risk
Outcomes being supported
We provide you with water that is clean and safe to drink
We understand our impact on the wider environment and act responsibly
We keep your bills as low as possible
Progress measure for this theme of action
Measure:
Current performance:
Future target:
GHG emissions from our infrastructure investment
Measurement process in development
To be confirmed after measurement process developed
We invest over £1 million per day maintaining and developing
our region’s water and waste water infrastructure and
operations. We work directly and in partnership with delivery
partners to operate, maintain, refurbish and build treatment
works, pumping stations and pipework, as well as all the
peripheral assets involved. We procure a wide range of goods
and services in these activities, everything from chemicals
to consultants and paperclips to programme managers. Our
investment ensures we comply with existing and new legal
standards and our customers’ priorities.
We recognise the scale of the emissions embodied in our
extensive supply chain and the need to work in partnership to
achieve the best results. Traditionally, we have managed our
supply chain with Whole Life Cost firmly in mind.
75 | Part C: Mitigation
This approach has delivered many benefits for our business,
customers and delivery partners. It has also secured many
environmental benefits, with improved operational efficiency
achieved by replacing aged assets and minimising materials,
travel and waste. There are two elements to our approach:
• Asset delivery – sustainably reducing emissions through
enhanced design and optioneering of new assets and
infrastructure; and
• Supply chain procurement – sustainably reducing
emissions through smarter purchasing and tendering.
At the end of the supply chain we recognise that the
largest emissions associated with our services come from
customers’ use of water for heating and washing. We have
substantial engagement programmes with customers,
described in Section A2 .
C5.1 Reducing emissions in
our asset delivery
C5.2 Reducing emissions in our
supply chain procurement
Investment plans are informed by unit cost models and
government data to factor emissions into our decisions on
where, when and how to invest. Our approach is enabling
us to include the climate change impact in our benefit
assessment and to determine the total operational and
embodied GHG impact of our plans.
Our ambition is for our global supply chains to share our
commitment to the continuous improvement of the water
environment and wider sustainable development. Our
sustainable supply chain policy applies across all our supply
chain activities and seeks to articulate a consistent approach
with straightforward expectations. We will work with our
supply chain partners to continually reduce demand for
depleting natural resources whilst enabling a cycle of social,
economic and environmental improvements. We expect that
our supply chain partners will deliver a similar message within
their own supply chains.
We started using this approach in 2009 and our approach
continues to mature with three themes of ongoing activity:
• Data collection and modelling – We have enhanced
the GHG aspects of our unit cost models with more
detailed data. We are now working to embed a continual
improvement cycle where ‘as-built’ GHG data regularly
feeds our unit cost models and becomes a seamless
part of the investment planning and project life-cycle.
• Whole Life Cost accounting – We have developed our
Whole Life Cost tools to incorporate the impacts of GHG.
This allows the GHG footprint of different options to be
compared to inform the most sustainable approach. We
already do this as standard at the programme level. To
maximise the efficiency benefit we are currently working to
incorporate this as standard at the individual scheme level.
• Incentivising GHG reduction – We are currently
working to introduce emissions reduction incentives
into our partner management processes, for example
by introducing a key performance indicator (KPI) on
the amount of GHG reduction achieved through
scheme design and optioneering.
76 | Part C: Mitigation
The policy can be found on our website at
yorkshirewater.com/about-us/supplying-us.aspx
.
Our new approach supports emissions reduction in a
number of ways:
• Sustainability impact assessment – We aspire to
enhance our approach to the inclusion of sustainability
factors in our tendering assessment process. GHG
emissions can be an important consideration in many
of our purchases, for example electricity and chemicals.
• GHG reporting – For several years, our largest capital
and maintenance delivery partners have reported the
emissions they produce in supporting our operations.
We aspire to extend our approach to become risk-based
and we are considering introducing requirements into
new contracts for all high-GHG activities. Partner emissions
data is incorporated into our operational carbon footprint
where applicable.
River Nidd, Knaresborough
Glossary of terms
Adaptation*
Action to prepare for climate change
ASC
Adaptation Sub-Committee: Part of the Committee on Climate Change who are
the government’s formal advisors on climate change
Carbon
The element Carbon, often used as shorthand to mean all greenhouse gasses
Carbon footprint
A measure of the emissions from an organisation, product or service
Climate*
The average weather experienced over a period of time, usually 30 years
Climate change*
Long-term changes to the weather, in this context we mean the unprecedented
rate of change being observed in recent times
DAP
Drainage Area Plan: A model of a drainage catchment to help understand risk and target
improvement action
Defra
Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
DG5
Director General Measure Number 5: A water industry measure for sewer flooding
EA
Environment Agency
EAP
Environment Advisory Panel: An independent group of stakeholders and regulators
that help direct Yorkshire Water’s activities and plans.
Embodied emissions
The emissions created during the construction of a product or service (also known
as embedded emissions)
GHG
Greenhouse gasses, which contribute to climate change
IPCC*
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change: A scientific body established by the United
Nations (UN) to assess the latest evidence for, and understanding of, climate change
KPI
Key Performance Indicator
KtCO2e
Kilo tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent: A comparable measure to account for the
different global warming effects of the various greenhouse gasses. For example Methane
has 25 times more global warming potential than carbon dioxide. This is similar to the
concept ‘barrels of oil equivalent’
Mitigation
Action to reduce future climate change
Ml/d
Mega litres per day or a million litres per day
NCERM
National Coastal Erosion Risk Maps
Ofwat
Office of Water services: The water industry’s economic regulator
Outcome
The end result, in this context we mean the long-term objectives our customers have
said they expect from us
Resilience*
The ability to withstand a hazard
SuDS
Sustainable Drainage Systems: A range of approaches that can help manage water
to reduce the risk of flooding
UKCP09*
UK Climate Projections 2009: The latest and most advanced UK climate change
projections available to us
Weather*
The day-to-day temperature, rainfall and wind conditions
WFD
Water Framework Directive: Legislation from the European Union to protect and
enhance the water environment
WRMP
Water Resources Management Plan: Our 25 year plan to ensure we can maintain
water supplies while protecting the environment
WTW
Water Treatment Works
WwTW
Waste water Treatment Works, also known as a Sewage Treatment Works
*Further explanation of these terms and others can be found in Appendix 1 of the climate change position paper
we published in July 2012. This can be found on our website at: yorkshirewater.co.uk/climatechange
78 | Glossary of terms
References
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
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17.
18.
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24.
25.
26.
27.
28.
29.
30.
31.
32.
33.
34.
35.
36.
37.
38.
39.
UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (2013) Working group 1 Contribution to the IPCC fifth assessment
report – Climate change 2013: The physical science basis – Summary for policymakers
Met Office (2013) The changing climate: past changes and future projections
Environment Agency (2013) Business plan evaluation response to Yorkshire Water Services
Adaptation Sub-Committee (2013) Managing the land in a changing climate
Cabinet Office (2011) Keeping the country running: Natural hazards and infrastructure
Environment Agency (2011) Adapting to climate change: Advice for flood and coastal erosion risk management authorities
Ofwat - Mott MacDonald (2012) Principles for resilience planning
Met Office (2010) Evidence: The state of the climate
National Oceanographic Centre (Unknown date) Their website
University of Oxford (2011) Anthropogenic greenhouse gas contribution to flood risk in England and Wales in autumn 2000,
in Nature vol 470
Met Office (Unknown date) The wet autumn of 2000 (webpage)
Acclimatise and UKCIP (2006) The adaptation tipping point: Are UK businesses climate proof?
Georgia Institute of Technology and Institute of Atmospheric Physics (2012) Impact of declining Arctic sea ice on winter
snowfall, in PNAS February 2012
Defra (2012) Statement of obligations
Ofwat (2011) Customer engagement policy statement
Yorkshire Water – DJS Research (2012) Securing future water supplies
Yorkshire Water – WSP Environment and Energy (2012) Kelda’s world in 2036
Defra – Ipsos Mori (2012) Programme of research on preparedness, adaptation and risk (PREPARE)
Yorkshire Water - Accent (2012) Valuing water
Ofwat – Creative Research (2011) Attitudes to water services in a changing climate - Report of research findings (Volume 1)
David Stewart, Chair of the independent Environmental Advisory Panel (2013) Email
Andrea Cook, Chair of the independent Customer Forum (2013) Email
Yorkshire Water – DJS Research (2013) PR14 Acceptability research
DECC (2013) Updated short-term traded carbon values used for modelling purposes
Ofwat (2010) Resilient supplies. How do we ensure secure water and sewerage services?
Yorkshire Water – University of Newcastle (2013) Customer preferences, willingness-to-pay and willingness-to-accept
changes in water service measures: A choice experiment
Yorkshire Water - Leeds University (2012) An evaluation of upland catchment management schemes for raw water
improvement
Yorkshire Water – Creative Research (2013) Regulatory outcomes
Ofwat – Mott MacDonald (2011) Future impacts on sewer systems in England and Wales.
EA and Ofwat (2013) Drainage strategy framework
Defra (2011) Water for life
Environment Agency (2013) Water for life and livelihoods: Humber river basin district: challenges and choices
Quinn J, Philip L and Murphy W (2009) Understanding the recession of the Holderness Coast, East Yorkshire, UK: a new
presentation of temporal and spatial patterns. Quarterly Journal of Engineering Geology and Hydrogeology, 42, 165-178
Baxter P. (2005) The East Coast Big Flood, 31 January - 1 February 1953: A Summary of the Human Disaster.
Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society, Vol 363. 15 June 2005
The Cabinet Office (2013) National risk register of civil emergencies
Council for Science and Technology (2009) Improving innovation in the water industry: 21st century challenges
and opportunities
DECC (2013) Valuation of energy use and greenhouse gas emissions for appraisal: Tables 1-20: supporting the toolkit
and the guidance
European Commission (2007) Communication from the Commission…Limiting global climate change to 2 degrees
Celsius: The way ahead for 2020 and beyond.
The Association of Fleet Operators (2013) www.acfo.org/news/details/17-10-2013/ald-reports-company-car-co2-emissionsand-mileage-at-record-low
40. Defra – Centre for Ecology and Hydrology (2010) Greenhouse gas emissions associated with non-gaseous losses of
Carbon - fate of particulate and dissolved carbon - SP1205
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catchments Phase II
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79 | References
Appendix
Medium risk
81 | Appendix 1
High risk
Low risk
Here we summarise our risk position as we stand in Autumn 2013, and our anticipated risk position in 2020 assuming the
implementation of our Business Plan. Risks have been mapped to our customers’ long-term priorities, known as outcomes.
Below is a summary of our latest strategic climate change risk assessment,
updating the details we published in our July 2012 paper.
Strategic climate change risk register
Appendix 1
Low
Low
Sea level rise and abstraction rates cause
gradual salinisation of coastal aquifers, resulting
in increased treatment costs and ultimately, the
loss of a significant water resource option, thereby
impacting quality of water for customers.
Warmer temperatures lead to greater incidence
of water and vector-borne diseases leading to
greater health risk to staff and/or public. For
example, drinking water and bathing waters.
WQ3:
Salinisation
of water
resources
WQ4: Water
borne diseases
82 | Appendix 1
Low
2012
WQ2: Rainfall
impacts raw
water quality
2030s 2050s 2080s
Drought or heavy rainfall affects raw water quality
by increasing pollutant loads beyond works treatment
capacity. This requires notable operational expense
(e.g. tanking, chemicals, energy) in order to maintain
compliance with quality standards for the customer.
Of particular concern at standalone, direct-fed sites
like WTW in Yorkshire Dales.
2020
Low
2030s 2050s 2080s
WQ1: Land
management
(particularly
moorland peat)
2013
Land use and the changing climate lead to
deterioration in raw water quality beyond works
treatment capacity (e.g. peat erosion due to drying
out and/or wildfire). This requires notable operational
expense (e.g. tanking, chemicals, energy) in order to
maintain compliance with quality standards for the
customer, and ultimately could result in the loss of a
source of drinking water. As well as water quality
issues, this risk includes significant greenhouse gas
impact when carbon is released from peat or soil.
NB: Relates to risk WR4 'Reservoir siltation'.
Trend
Low
Low
Medium
Medium
2013
Risk
understanding
Risk description
2020: After our next
round of risk mitigation
Risk title
2013: As we stand today
We provide you with water that is clean and safe to drink
Ensuring safe water is a company priority and we have strong
operational and monitoring controls. This risk could increase in the
future as warmer weather allows pests and diseases to survive and
spread more easily. We will continue to monitor and manage this risk.
Coastal groundwaters are at risk of becoming increasingly
saline as sea levels rise and salt water penetrates further inland.
We will investigate this risk to inform our long-term response.
Severe weather events can wash pesticides and other contaminants
from land into the water we take for treatment and supply. This
requires extra treatment, which is expensive and can cause us to
temporarily shut some of our smaller, rural treatment works. We are
taking a twin-track approach to tackle this problem. Firstly, we are
investing in our treatment works to improve process reliability and
secondly, we are also working with land owners and farmers to
improve raw water quality, for example by planting buffer strips
along rivers, or installing slurry tanks on farms.
We've observed a demonstrable deterioration in raw water
quality from our peat uplands sources, linked to land
management practices such as sheep grazing and heather
burning. Peat uplands in poor condition release dissolved organic
carbon which is difficult to remove and contributes to climate
change by releasing carbon. We are taking a twin-track approach
to this problem, managing immediate risks by investing in water
treatment works to ensure we continue to meet drinking water
quality standards for our customers. We also tackle the issue
at source through our catchment management programme,
where we work in partnership with landowners and managers.
Headlines of our position and response
Low
Low
Low
Sub-zero temperatures and moisture deficit
cause widespread pipe bursts leading to failure
to meet leakage and/or serviceability targets
and/or loss of supply.
Land use and the changing climate results in
soil erosion, leading to siltation of reservoirs
and reduced storage capacity, increasing risk
of supply interruption to customers.
National events result in the need to transfer
water to other regions leading to reduced
service to our region.
WR3: Cold
causes bursts
WR4: Reservoir
siltation
WR5: National
emergency
water transfer
83 | Appendix 1
Low
2012
WR2: Demand
exceeds
distribution
2030s 2050s 2080s
Drier summers, combined with extreme heat, lead
to high levels of demand that exceed distribution
capacity, causing interruptions to customers'
supplies. This risk can also be caused by extreme
cold due to increase in bursts and leaks.
2020
Low to
Medium
2030s 2050s 2080s
WR1: Demand
exceeds supply
2013
Drier summers, combined with extreme heat, lead
to insufficient water resources and/or treatment
capacity to meet demand, leading to customer
restrictions and/or environmental impact (reduced
compensation flows). Notable financial and carbon
impacts from increased pumping and/or tankering.
Trend
Low
Medium
Medium
Medium
High
2013
Risk
understanding
Risk description
2020: After our next
round of risk mitigation
Risk title
2013: As we stand today
We make sure that you always have enough water
We recognise our role in national water security. When developing
our Water Resources Management Plan we work with other water
companies to find the most sustainable way to meet customer
demand. We trade water with neighbouring water companies
where this is cost-effective, currently sharing supplies with Severn
Trent Water and Anglian Water. We work with the multi-agency
resilience forums that operate in our region to develop effective
emergency response plans. We also have a mutual aid agreement
with other water companies to share resources in an emergency.
We will continue to monitor this risk and ensure our preparedness.
We work with farmers and land managers to tackle this issue
at source through our catchment management programme,
which encourages good practice such as planting buffer strips
and ploughing along the contours of land to reduce erosion.
We enhanced our ability to deal with very cold weather after
the two harsh winters we've experienced in recent years.
Our Winter Plans set out how we will maintain water supplies
through extreme cold, for example by allocating more resource
to our burst and leakage response teams if harsh weather is
forecast. We will maintain and enhance our highly flexible
and resilient grid network that allows us to move water around
the region to where it is needed.
We operate 31,000km of pipes to distribute treated water to
customers. We have improved the flexibility and reliability of the
water network to substantially reduce the risk of interruption to
customers’ supply. We have reduced the amount of water that is
wasted by working with customers, and by almost halving our
leakage since privatisation in 1989. We continue to maintain and
enhance the network, reduce leakage and develop our ability
to model the network to help us target investment.
Our Water Resources Management Plan (WRMP) sets out how
we ensure customers’ water supplies for the long term,
accounting for the needs of the environment, the changing
climate, population growth, new development, and affordability.
Our latest assessment shows that we face a growing gap
between the amount of water available (supply) and the amount
required (demand) because of climate change. Our WRMP sets
out how we will deal with this gap, with the first priority being to
reduce leakage. In future years we can implement further options
to meet the growing deficit. We monitor and respond to this risk
in an iterative way, updating our WRMP every five years.
Headlines of our position and response
84 | Appendix 1
Rising sea levels lead to restricted outfalls
resulting in flooding and pollution.
WW3: Outfalls
restricted by
sea level rise
Low
Low to
Medium
2012
Heavy rainfall, or prolonged dry spells followed
by rain, causes sewers to be overwhelmed or
blocked, resulting in pollution of watercourses
and/or bathing beaches. For example, debris can
be flushed from the sewer into a low-flow river
when a short, sharp rainfall event follows a dry spell.
2030s 2050s 2080s
WW2:
Overloaded
sewers cause
pollution
2020
Medium
to High
2030s 2050s 2080s
Rainfall leads to inundation of the drainage
network causing widespread flooding.
Could be compounded by high river levels
preventing storm overflows from operating.
2013
WW1:
Overloaded
sewers cause
flooding
Trend
Low
Medium
Medium
2013
Risk
understanding
Risk description
2020: After our next
round of risk mitigation
Risk title
2013: As we stand today
We have operational plans and facilities to proactively and
reactively respond to sewer issues such as restricted outfalls.
We will monitor this risk and consider further needs.
We maintain and enhance our sewer network to manage
the risk of sewer pollution. We have operational plans and
facilities to proactively and reactively respond to sewer pollution
events. For example, we have extensive telemetry to warn us of
potential risks. We also invest in additional pump and storage
capacity to contain more flow within the system, for example
recently building new storm tanks in Bridlington to protect
against bathing beach pollution. We work closely with the
Environment Agency in defining our approach and we educate
customers about what should and shouldn't be disposed of via
the sewer. We recognise increasing pressures on our sewerage
system, and are modelling our catchments to better predict risk
and target investment to reduce the risk of polluting discharges.
We will be introducing Event Duration Monitoring on many of
our overflows to help us prevent problems and enhance the
accuracy of our modelling.
We maintain and enhance our sewer network to manage the risk
of sewer flooding. We have operational plans and facilities to
proactively and reactively respond to sewer flooding events.
We also invest in additional pump and storage capacity, and are
considering new approaches like Sustainable Drainage Systems
(SuDS). We work in partnership with other local and regional
flood management authorities to consider shared risks and
collaboration opportunities. To help inform our approach, we are
part way through a long term project to model our sewer
network by building Drainage Area Plans (DAPs). We are evolving
our approach to DAPs and sewer management to align with the
principles of our regulators new Drainage Strategy Framework.
Headlines of our position and response
We take care of your waste water and protect you and the environment from sewer flooding
85 | Appendix 1
Low
2012
Extreme temperatures and/or drought impact
on biological treatment processes because of
difficulty in aerating stronger, more septic sewage,
leading to compliance failure. In addition, warmer
weather increases nuisance problems, such as flies
and/or odour, leading to nuisance orders/fines.
2030s 2050s 2080s
WE2: Treating
sewage in hot/
dry
2020
Low
2030s 2050s 2080s
WE1:
Biodiversity
2013
Biodiversity changes in response to the changing
climate lead to maintenance costs, operational
issues and service interruptions where our assets
and processes are challenged by invasive species
(e.g. Zebra mussels in water infrastructure). Equally,
the health of native and/or protected species is
impeded by our infrastructure (e.g. weirs), or
operations (e.g. waste water discharge), which
restricts their resilience to the changing climate.
Trend
Low
Medium
2013
Risk
understanding
Risk description
2020: After our next
round of risk mitigation
Risk title
2013: As we stand today
We protect and improve the water environment
We are investing to improve the reliability and flexibility of
our WwTW and will continue to monitor this risk and consider
further needs. We don’t anticipate this risk materialising in
the short to medium term as we use the same processes in
the UK as warmer countries such as Spain and Italy do,
without problems.
We are investing in various programmes to remove invasive
species and support protected species on our sites, and in
partnership with our landowners, e.g. fish passage, ancient
woodland restoration, SSSI management. We have enhanced
our operational procedures and continue to improve our data
to better enable good biodiversity management practices.
Headlines of our position and response
N/A
The financial cost of greenhouse gas emissions
and supporting grid-decarbonisation makes our
customers’ bills unaffordable.
E3:
Greenhouse
gas emissions
86 | Appendix 1
Low
2012
Increasingly variable rainfall impacts the load to
WwTW, causing potential treatment problems
and variability in sludge quality and quantity,
leading to compliance issues. Extreme cold also
presents risks to waste water treatment process.
2030s 2050s 2080s
E2: Sludge
treatment
capability
2020
Low
2030s 2050s 2080s
Extreme weather in the peak recycling months
delays spreading to land, requiring accumulation
of sludge on site until the next available window,
leading to increased costs and compliance failures.
2013
E1: Sludge
storage - land
application
window
Trend
High
Low
Low
2013
Risk
understanding
Risk description
2020: After our next
round of risk mitigation
Risk title
2013: As we stand today
We understand our impact on the wider environment and act responsibly
We have successfully reduced our operational greenhouse
gas emissions in recent years, despite upward pressure
from new legislative requirements. Electricity accounts for
approximately 75% of our operational emissions, and we
have reduced emissions by becoming more energy efficient
and generating our own low-carbon renewable energy
(primarily from sewage sludge). In the future, we will seek
further opportunities for cost-effective energy efficiency
and self-generation. We will also increase our focus on
reducing our other sources of emissions.
We are investing to upgrade the capabilities (resilience) of
many of our WwTW. We will continue to monitor this risk
and consider further needs.
We manage the sludge end-product of the sewage
treatment process through a number of methods. We are
moving away from incineration and increasing sludge
recycling to land (as a fertiliser substitute) and for energy.
We will be increasing our storage capacity by 2020 to
help buffer against this risk.
Headlines of our position and response
Low
Prolonged heavy rains result in failure of a
reservoir, leading to safety implications and loss
of asset/water resource.
Intense rainfall results in landslips that lead to loss
of critical assets, leading to loss of service, pollution
incident, or personal injury.
CS4: Reservoir
failure
CS5: Landslips
87 | Appendix 1
Low
Coastal erosion leads to loss of assets and
therefore service.
Medium
Low
Medium
2012
CS3: Coastal
erosion
2030s 2050s 2080s
CS2: Storm
surge
2020
Storm surge causes coastal and/or estuarine
flooding that damages assets leading to pollution,
flooding (of our critical assets and our customers)
and/or compliance failure. May also salinise
aquifers, see risk WQ3.
2030s 2050s 2080s
Flooding (from any source) of critical assets
results in loss of service.
2013
CS1: Flooding
of our assets
Trend
Low
High
High
Medium
Medium
2013
Risk
understanding
Risk description
2020: After our next
round of risk mitigation
Risk title
2013: As we stand today
We provide the level of customer service you expect and value
We have experienced small, localised landslips in the past,
mainly after very heavy rainfall. We will continue to monitor
this risk and consider further needs.
We have extensive checks and plans in place to mitigate this
risk, underpinned by legislative requirements. We have assessed
our risk from reservoir failure, and by 2020 will be investing to
ensure reservoir safety compliance by refurbishing spillways,
improving drawdown outlet capacity, and updating our flood
management plans.
We have assessed which of our assets are at risk from coastal
erosion in the short, medium and long term. By 2020 we will
need to protect or relocate Withernsea WwTW as well as some
pumping stations and pipes. Our assessment shows further
assets at risk beyond 2020, and we'll repeat our risk assessment
to inform future investment needs.
We have carried out an initial assessment of our risk from storm
surge and will use this to inform our emergency response plans.
We are also enhancing our emergency preparedness provisions.
We will continue to support Local Resilience Forums in their civil
emergency planning (currently preparing coastal inundation plans
for our region), and will take part in any exercises or training that
may be required.
We have completed a quantitative assessment of our risk from
fluvial flooding and prioritised sites which would be benefit most
from enhanced resilience. We will seek to improve resilience at our
priority sites when we work at these locations for other reasons,
and as further funding becomes available. We have extensive
operational response plans in place to respond to heavy rainfall
events and we are enhancing our emergency preparedness with
demountable defences and emergency response plans.
Headlines of our position and response
Low
Emergency response to extreme weather leads to
staff carrying out their roles differently, or covering
for roles they are untrained for or are unfamiliar with,
or insufficient staff, causing loss of service and/or
H&S concerns.
Widespread loss of critical IT, including telemetry,
due to extreme weather can result in significantly
reduced ability to operate and thereby impact
service. Emergency working arrangements in
extreme weather can overwhelm IT capabilities or
result in systems/processes being bypassed, resulting
in knock-on impacts to operations and service.
CS9: Resilient
human
resources
CS10: Resilient
IT and
telemetry
88 | Appendix 1
Low
Extreme weather leads to severe injury or loss of
life that is linked to YW activity or sites (e.g. unsafe
drinking water or flooding). Could be a member
of the public or a member of staff.
Medium
2013
Low to
Medium
Medium
Low
Low
Medium Medium
Low
2012
CS8: Resilient
health and
safety
2030s 2050s 2080s
Prolonged cold leads to frozen WTW, WwTW,
sludge treatment or other critical assets, causing
issues with compliance and service.
2020
CS7: Freezing
treatment
works
2030s 2050s 2080s
Scour of bridges and foundations caused by swollen
rivers causes loss of assets (e.g. pipes across bridges)
leading to loss of supply or pollution.
2013
CS6: Scour of
bridges and
foundations
Trend
Risk
understanding
Risk description
2020: After our next
round of risk mitigation
Risk title
2013: As we stand today
We provide the level of customer service you expect and value
We have resilient IT systems with multiple layers of security
controls and back-up arrangements (compliant with information
security standard ISO 27001). We regularly test our IT resilience
and have robust business continuity processes in place. With
generally short asset lives, we will be able to ensure the right IT
systems at each point of purchase.
We review our approach after all extreme events that
significantly challenge our operations to identify and implement
improvements. Our Incident Management Procedure follows
industry best practice. We have re-organised our business and
our people to be more agile to the needs of an extreme event.
Health and safety is our top priority, with extensive
procedures and controls in place. We will continue to
review and update our approach regularly.
We have enhanced our resilience to cold weather following
the harsh winters of 2009/10 and 2010/11, for example by
installing trace heating and pipe lagging at many of our WTW.
We have also reviewed and enhanced our Winter Plans to make
sure we have adequate resources in place if severe weather is
forecast. We plan a small programme of further 'winterisation'
measures before 2020.
We have surveyed a representative sample of the relevant
assets and used this to inform our needs to 2020. This survey
includes the risk of scour and recommends appropriate building
and maintenance work. We will continue to monitor this risk
and consider our long-term business needs.
Headlines of our position and response
Low
Low
Extreme weather impacts YW’s ability to implement
its asset delivery programme on time, to cost and/or
in a safe way, impacting upon compliance or service.
Assets are not maintained and/or repaired properly
so that they do not perform to their design capacity
when needed during an extreme event, leading to
loss of service, non-compliance or health risk.
CS13: Resilient
energy selfgeneration
CS14: Resilient
asset delivery
CS15:
Resilient asset
maintenance
89 | Appendix 1
Low
Extreme weather impacts YW’s energy selfgeneration capabilities interrupting services,
or (positively or negatively) impacting cost,
carbon emissions and national grid. This risk
will become more important as YW generates
more of its own energy in the future.
2013
Low
Low
Low
Low
Medium Medium
2012
Low
2030s 2050s 2080s
YW supply chain (locally and/or globally) is
interrupted, causing loss of service, for example
grid electricity or treatment chemicals.
2020
CS12: Resilient
supply chain,
including grid
electricity
2030s 2050s 2080s
CS11: Resilient
transport
2013
Extreme weather events lead to widespread
travel disruption inhibiting staff getting to work or
site for prolonged periods, leading to loss of service.
Extreme weather can also increase the safety risks
involved in travel.
Trend
Risk
understanding
Risk description
2020: After our next
round of risk mitigation
Risk title
2013: As we stand today
We provide the level of customer service you expect and value
We recognise that we have an ageing asset base, and
understand how important effective asset maintenance
is in maintaining service. We will be increasing our budget
in this area to 2020 and will continue to monitor our
maintenance needs for the long term. We will continue
to participate in collaborative research with other water
companies to investigate innovations in materials, processes
and technologies to ensure we are following industry best
practice in asset maintenance and management.
We allow a degree of flexibility in our delivery approach to
allow for the unexpected and still achieve compliance with
regulatory deadlines. We will keep this risk under review and
consider any further business needs.
We currently generate about 7% of our electricity needs using
our own renewable sources, with grid-electricity back-up if
required. We have a range of renewable technologies across
many locations, so our risk of widespread interruption is low.
We will be maintaining and enhancing the resilience and capacity
of our renewable energy assets. In the long term, we will ensure
highly resilient renewable assets and operational procedures as
we increase the scale of our generation capabilities.
We manage the risk of our supply chain being interrupted
by ensuring we have good contract arrangements in place
with our major suppliers and have recently updated our
Sustainable Supply Chain policy, available on our website.
We have enhanced our resilience to the loss of essential third
party supplies. For example, we have enhanced our resilience
to the loss of grid electricity through a number of measures
such as emergency generator facilities and increasing our
ability to self-generate. We communicate regularly with our
supply chain and drive continual improvement.
We have emergency procedures and facilities (such as
stockpiles of critical chemicals and remote access facilities) in
order to support our operations if transport is hindered. We
are also ready to temporarily increase our transport capabilities
in extreme conditions if required, for example by hiring
off-road vehicles in harsh winters.
Headlines of our position and response
90 | Appendix 1
Low
2012
CS17:
Legal action
2030s 2050s 2080s
Extreme weather increases exposure to legal
action from H&S incidents, non-compliance and/or
other prosecutions leading to costs and/or damage
to our reputation. For example, warmer weather
results in flies and/or odour problems leading to
nuisance orders/fines.
2020
Low
2030s 2050s 2080s
Failure to adequately communicate what YW is
doing in response to an emergency weather event,
leading to reputational damage.
2013
CS16:
Resilient external
communications
Trend
Low
Low
2013
Risk
understanding
Risk description
2020: After our next
round of risk mitigation
Risk title
2013: As we stand today
We provide the level of customer service you expect and value
We have robust processes and procedures in place to ensure
the safety and resilience of our assets, sites and people in
extreme weather. We will continue to review these regularly
to inform our business needs.
We have strong communication capabilities, with multiple
channels (including social media) available to share live
information with customers and partners when incidents
happen. Senior communication staff are included in our
incident management teams to ensure effective and timely
sharing of information. We will continue to monitor this risk
and consider future business needs.
Headlines of our position and response
Low
Low
Insurance becomes increasingly expensive due
to exposure from increasingly extreme weather
(and ultimately cover could be refused)
Harsher weather and higher levels of atmospheric
carbon result in more rapid deterioration of assets
and therefore increased cost of maintenance
(e.g. degrading concrete faster).
B4: Insurance
costs
B5: Faster asset
deterioration
91 | Appendix 1
Low
YW seen as a riskier business due to extreme
events and projected water scarcity, thereby
increasing the cost of capital.
B3: Cost
of capital
Medium
2012
Low
2030s 2050s 2080s
Climate change requires increasing financial
resource to maintain service, leading to increased
pressure on affordability, particularly for vulnerable
customers, pushing customers into 'water poverty'.
2020
B2:
Affordability
2030s 2050s 2080s
Inability to secure regulatory, political and/or
customer approval for the investment required
to maintain services in a changing climate,
leading to service failures.
2013
Low
Low
Medium
Low
Medium
2013
Risk
understanding
B1: Inability to
secure approval
Trend
2020: After our next
round of risk mitigation
Risk description
2013: As we stand today
Risk title
We keep your bills as low as possible
We recognise that we have an ageing asset base, and understand
how important effective asset maintenance is, in maintaining
service. We will be increasing our budget in this area to 2020
and will continue to monitor our maintenance needs for the long
term. We will continue to participate in collaborative research
with other water companies to investigate innovations in
materials, processes and technologies to ensure we are following
industry best practice in asset maintenance and management.
Our climate change strategy aims to mitigate this risk by
keeping pace with the challenges posed by the changing
climate. Insurance cover is an essential part of our climate
change strategy and we will maintain strong working relations
with the insurance industry to demonstrate our resilient business.
We are well placed to manage extreme weather and climate
change in the short term, for example with high standards and
robust emergency arrangements. We recognise that further
intervention is likely to be increasingly necessary to maintain our
current position over the long term. We will review our needs
every five years as part of the regulatory business planning process.
Our Tax and Treasury Team manage our relationship with credit
ratings agencies and undertake regular financability checks on
behalf of the business to monitor, and mitigate, this risk.
Water poverty (a household spending more than 3% of disposable
income on water and sewerage services) currently affects around
one fifth of our customers. We aim to keep bills at the lowest level
possible for everyone and are holding them steady to 2020 (rising
only with inflation) despite many upward pressures (including
climate change and weather resilience). We have several schemes to
provide assistance to customers in real need, including WaterSure,
Resolve, our Community Trust and the Helping Hands register. We
have asked customers whether we should implement a social tariff
scheme and they are currently unconvinced this is the most
acceptable method of support. We will continue to keep bills as low
as possible, investigate social tariffs, monitor levels of water poverty,
and seek a national debate on the challenge of affordability.
We must demonstrate that our customers, stakeholders and
regulators support our business plan in order for Ofwat to approve
it. We have secured strong support for our business plan to 2020,
which includes a broad range of measures to enhance resilience
(as outlined in our climate change strategy). As the climate changes,
we expect to have to increase our spending on resilience measures
in order to maintain services. We recognise that obtaining support
for this spending could be challenging (hence the red risk at 2020),
and we seek national debate on the matter. We will seek to mitigate
this risk by being open and transparent about our decisions,
demonstrating how our proposals are good value for money, using
the latest and best available evidence, and working in partnership
with others to achieve wider benefits from our investments.
Headlines of our position and response
Appendix 2
Data, guidance and principles used
in our climate change strategy
Below we summarise the primary
sources of data and guidance
we have used throughout the
development of our strategy.
In addition, relevant sections explain where other data
and guidance has been used in theme-specific assessments.
We also describe the principles that have underpinned
our approach.
Data and evidence
UK Climate Projections 2009 (UKCP09)
UKCP09 are advanced climate projections that provide data on
a range of climate variables such as rainfall and temperature.
There are projections for each decade to the end of the
century, in 30-year time periods. The projections are available
for three emissions scenarios: high, medium and low. We have
used UKCP09 to underpin our climate change assessments
because it is widely recognised as the best available climate
change evidence to incorporate into planning decisions in the
UK. We have tailored our specific approach to each detailed
assessment because there is no one-size-fits-all approach with
the vast set of data available.
EA flood and coastal erosion maps
The EA provide a range of flood and coastal erosion maps
that provide the best available information on such risks.
Climate change is incorporated into many of these maps, in
different ways depending on when and how the maps were
constructed. We have used these maps in our flood and
coastal erosion risk assessments.
Met Office weather data records
The Met Office provide a range of observed weather data.
We have used various data sets in the development of our
climate change strategy.
Internal GIS and data records
We have a bespoke Geographical Information System (GIS)
that we have used to support our risk assessment by mapping
our asset information to other relevant data such as EA flood
maps. We have also used a range of our own data records to
inform our risk understanding and response plans. For example
we have use our reservoir inflow data to inform our water
resources plan.
92 | Appendix 2
Guidance
Cabinet Office: ‘Keeping the Country Running
– Natural Hazards and Infrastructure’ (20115)
The purpose of this publication is “to share best practice
and advice to enable organisations to continually improve
their infrastructure’s resilience to natural hazards”. The
publication set out the worst case scenarios that national
infrastructure providers can reasonably be expected to plan
for, suggested levels of resilience and a four box model of
infrastructure resilience principles.
We have ensured an effective approach to infrastructure
resilience in our climate change strategy by following the
guidance provided in this report. We are ensuring effective
infrastructure resilience by taking action in all four of the
‘strategic components’ of the Cabinet Office model (shown
in the diagram). We seek to work to at least the stated worst
case scenarios and suggested levels of resilience wherever
we can practically do so, being constrained by affordability
and customer/regulator support.
Resistance
Protection to
withstand a hazard
(e.g. a flood wall)
Reliability
The ability of an asset
to operate in a range
of conditions
(e.g. asset design)
Infrastructure
resilience
Redundancy
Design capacity
into a system
(e.g. backup pumps)
Response
and recovery
Enabling fast and
effective response to, and
recovery from, an event
(e.g. emergency planning)
Ofwat (Mott Macdonald): Resilience –
outcomes focused regulation, Principles for
resilience planning (20127)
This publication builds on the Cabinet Office work and
provides “principles for resilience planning, together with
examples of available evidence and of different resilience
planning practices”. We have incorporated these principles
throughout our climate change strategy.
EA/Ofwat/Defra/Welsh government: Water resource
and Drought planning guidelines series (2011 and 2012)
This series of publications provides a framework for water
companies to follow when developing their water resources
plans and drought plans. It sets out good practice, the various
approaches to follow and the information that a plan should
contain. The guidelines include a defined approach to the
assessment of climate change in water resource planning.
We have supported the development of the guidelines and
followed the stated approaches when developing our water
resource plan and drought plan.
1. An all-hazards approach to resilience planning
2. Proportionate resilience strategies embedded
into corporate governance
3. Third party engagement
4. Resilience planning focused on risk to
service outcomes
5. Customer preferences and environmental
acceptability for different levels of resilience
6. Broad consideration of intervention options
for resilience
Principles underpinning
our strategy
We have defined a series of principles to ensure the right
balance throughout our climate change strategy. We
have ensured our principles align with those that others
have described in a number of external publications, such
as Principles for Resilience Planning (Ofwat, 20127). Our
underlying principles are summarised in three themes:
1. Using the best available evidence and methodologies
7. Using cost benefit analysis to support
significant decisions
Risk-based approach that consider the customer
service outcomes
8. Preparedness for response and recovery
Cost-benefit analysis
9. Continuous improvement in resilience planning
Assessments are documented and repeatable
2. Balancing the needs of today and the long-term
EA: Adapting to Climate Change – Advice for Flood and
Coastal Erosion Risk Management Authorities (20116)
This publication provides advice “to ensure that an
economically credible appraisal, taking account of the
uncertainties associated with climate change, can be made
to support government investment decisions”. The guidance
provides uplift factors to account for changes to relative mean
sea levels, peak river flood flows, extreme rainfall intensity and
storm surges, based on UKCP09. We have found the guidance
useful to inform our decisions regarding flood and coastal
erosion risk management.
A proportionate and pragmatic approach
Capital and operational responses
Maintain and maximise options for the future
Enabling and recognising continual improvement
3. Collaborating for the most effective result
Integrated internally
Expert input from leaders in their field, including
academics, colleagues and consultants
External engagement, partnership and support
Recognise dependencies
93 | Appendix 2
Appendix 3
Resilience assessment methodologies
Fluvial flooding assessment
methodology
We assessed the fluvial flood risk to our above ground
assets by working in partnership with Halcrow consultants.
The process started with an initial screening exercise that
showed approximately 1,200 assets are located in areas
shown to be prone to flooding on latest Environment Agency
(EA) fluvial flood maps. We also identified a small number
of assets which lay outside the flood map extents but which
had a history of flooding.
Prioritising the most critical assets, we then carried out a
comprehensive assessment at around 200 sites to establish
current levels of resilience and, where data was available,
how resilience may be affected by climate change. The site
assessments used the best available evidence to produce
individual site-specific reports. Evidence used in the
assessments included:
• Flood maps and hydraulic models from the EA
• Data from the National Flood and Coastal Defence
Database (NFCDD)
• Topographic surveys
resilience assessment and noted below the ‘flood hazard
table’ incorporated in site reports.
• Some EA models have been run twice for a 1:100 year
event; once with a 20% uplift and once without.
The difference between the two runs is added to the
levels for a 1:200 year event. Where this approach has
been taken it been noted in the site report.
• Some EA models have not been sensitivity tested and
climate change impact data is not available. In these cases
we have added an additional freeboard allowance for
settling, wave crest and uncertainty allowance depending
on the nature of the structure being raised up, and the
site-specific practicality of doing this, for example sufficient
height within the building to raise components. This is in
line with current national planning policy which suggests
adding a freeboard of 300 mm for hard defences like
concrete flood walls, or 500 mm for soft defences like
earthen embankments.
The impact of climate change on coastal sites was assessed
using government guidance on sea level rise (Environment
Agency, 20106). This was used to develop a 50 year estimate
for sea level rise of 400 mm. This figure is purely for sea level
rise and does not account for changes to wave heights,
storm surges or coastal erosion.
• LiDAR data
• Past history of flooding
• Knowledge from asset operators and business experts
The reports include photographs and height data for
important equipment, whether the site has flooded before
and what impacts it had, and copies of the flood maps and
climate change data. Where a site is behind a flood defence,
we consulted with the EA to determine their plans for that
flood defence in terms of its maintenance regime, what level
of protection it offers, and other relevant information.
The impact of climate change on an asset’s level of resilience
was assessed where data was available in EA hydraulic models.
The age and granularity of these hydraulic models varies. The
more modern models have usually had a sensitivity test applied
to examine the impact of climate change. Depending on the
best model data available for each site, we took the following
approach in our assessment, in order of preference:
• Some EA models have been run twice for a 1:200 year
event; once with and once without a 20% uplift in peak
river flows. The difference between the two runs is added
to the results to represent the impact of climate change.
Where this is available, the 1:200 year flood level with
climate change estimate has been included in our site
94 | Appendix 3
Coastal erosion methodology
We have worked with Arup to complete an assessment of
the risk from coastal erosion. This involved one project focused
on the priority asset of Withernsea Waste water Treatment
Works (WwTW) and another more general asset review.
Both projects have used the full range of available data to
assess which of our assets are at risk from coastal erosion
now and in the future. We performed an initial screen of our
assets using the newly published National Coastal and Erosion
Risk Mapping (NCERM) dataset. This was commissioned by
the EA and provides the best available evidence about future
coastal erosion. It shows the projected position of the
coastline in three time horizons (2030s, 2050s 2080s) and
three probabilities (5, 50 and 95 percentile). The NCERM
dataset includes for the effects of climate change and sea
level rise within the projections.
Where the NCERM data showed one of our assets to be at
risk, we have obtained additional information to provide a more
detailed analysis and inform our response. This additional data
includes historic maps, observed erosion rates from monitoring
stations operated by Local Authorities, LiDAR analysis and
commissioned surveys. We have also consulted the relevant
coastal plans and policies such as Shoreline Management Plans.