Browse content similar to 02/05/2012. Check below for episodes and series from the same categories and more!
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Hello from the village of West Overton in Wiltshire, where it's | :00:03. | :00:08. | |
been raining for the last week. So where's all the water gone? | :00:08. | :00:11. | |
On the programme tonight, I am investigating why this river is | :00:11. | :00:14. | |
still dry and I help a local resident face the stark reality of | :00:14. | :00:24. | |
:00:24. | :00:25. | ||
her water consumption. I am shocked over it all. | :00:25. | :00:28. | |
Also tonight, BBC meteorologist Nick Miller finds out why, after | :00:28. | :00:31. | |
the wettest April for a 100 years, large parts of the country are | :00:31. | :00:41. | |
:00:41. | :00:43. | ||
still in drought. Drought? What drought? It has not stopped raining | :00:43. | :00:46. | |
for the past few weeks. David Whitley heads south to see | :00:46. | :00:49. | |
what lessons we can learn as Spain struggles to cope with an | :00:49. | :00:55. | |
unprecedented spell of dry weather. And I'll be giving the latest | :00:55. | :01:04. | |
weather update for our region at I'm Alastair McKee and this is | :01:04. | :01:14. | |
Inside Out West. After the wet couple of weeks we've | :01:14. | :01:16. | |
just had, you'd be forgiven for wondering why we're still talking | :01:17. | :01:22. | |
about a drought. But take a look at this river at this time of year it | :01:22. | :01:25. | |
should be flowing above my waist. Inside Out has discovered that | :01:25. | :01:28. | |
despite the drought, Thames Water is still pumping out quantities | :01:28. | :01:38. | |
:01:38. | :01:39. | ||
which threaten the ecology of the river. | :01:39. | :01:42. | |
The trouble with water, it's been said, is that they're not making | :01:42. | :01:51. | |
any more of it. And yet we're using more than ever before. | :01:51. | :01:55. | |
The water is important to us, but I haven't got a clue where it comes | :01:55. | :01:57. | |
from. You open the tap and it comes out. | :01:57. | :01:59. | |
But after two dry winters, our extraordinary water consumption is | :01:59. | :02:05. | |
starting to hurt. I've stood in the Kennet at | :02:05. | :02:08. | |
Marlborough in the middle of winter, and it is bone dry. That's heart- | :02:08. | :02:11. | |
breaking. And now in the midst of a drought, | :02:11. | :02:16. | |
some of the world's most important habitats are under threat. | :02:16. | :02:19. | |
We have lovely rivers in this country. We're drinking them dry | :02:19. | :02:29. | |
:02:29. | :02:37. | ||
cos we don't value them. So you are taking me to another bit of red | :02:38. | :02:40. | |
there? I'm on the River Kennet in | :02:40. | :02:43. | |
Wiltshire, a source of water for tens of thousands of homes and one | :02:43. | :02:46. | |
of Europe's rarest habitats, with a number of protected species. | :02:46. | :02:56. | |
Now, I understand this is a chalkstream? Chalk streams get | :02:56. | :03:00. | |
their water from rainfall that lands on the chalk downs and soaks | :03:01. | :03:06. | |
in through the chalk and six in the underground aquifer, which is all | :03:06. | :03:11. | |
of the gaps like a giant sponge. Then the water comes out in a | :03:11. | :03:19. | |
series of springs. They are home Sturt trout, grayling, kingfishers, | :03:19. | :03:24. | |
they encapsulate what is wonderful about British dreams. We get them | :03:24. | :03:29. | |
here in the UK and a couple in France. That is it in the world. In | :03:29. | :03:33. | |
terms of the world resource, we have them here. | :03:33. | :03:36. | |
The drought has had a noticeable impact on the Kennet. At this time | :03:36. | :03:39. | |
of year river levels should be much higher. In some places it's dried | :03:39. | :03:42. | |
up completely. All of which is having a consequence on the river's | :03:42. | :03:52. | |
:03:52. | :03:55. | ||
wildlife. These are water shrimps and in a good survey we would be | :03:55. | :03:59. | |
counting them in their hundreds or thousands. Since the flair has been | :03:59. | :04:06. | |
dropping, we see few of them. These are water larvae. Since the | :04:06. | :04:10. | |
river has been dropping, we've seen fewer and fewer of them. Less food | :04:10. | :04:12. | |
for the birds. But it's not just the drought | :04:12. | :04:15. | |
having an impact on this river. A little way downstream is Thames | :04:15. | :04:17. | |
Water's Axford Borehole, which pumps water out of the underground | :04:17. | :04:20. | |
source of the Kennet. Every day seven million litres of that water | :04:20. | :04:25. | |
is piped to Swindon 15-miles away. For years this abstraction', as | :04:25. | :04:28. | |
it's called, has been blamed for reducing water levels, and | :04:28. | :04:38. | |
threatening wildlife. I've come to South Swindon where a | :04:38. | :04:42. | |
considerable amount of the water from the Kennet ends up. I'm | :04:42. | :04:45. | |
meeting the Warren family, with four children who all like their | :04:45. | :04:54. | |
water. So you are quite a big family here? Do you find you use a | :04:55. | :05:02. | |
lot of water? I try to keep the water down for usage just to help. | :05:02. | :05:09. | |
But Bath, showers, washing machines, they are so many reasons. With | :05:09. | :05:13. | |
baths, I do it every other day and a shower as well. The washing | :05:13. | :05:20. | |
machine goes on once or twice a day send their -- sometimes. Do you | :05:20. | :05:25. | |
know where water comes from? Thames Water. I don't know a lot about how | :05:25. | :05:31. | |
it gets here, it is from the tap. We would like to share a year. | :05:31. | :05:38. | |
would be called. I will lead on. Let's look at the river. | :05:38. | :05:42. | |
We'll be back with the Warrens in a moment. But first, I want to find | :05:42. | :05:44. | |
out more about the row over their water. | :05:44. | :05:47. | |
For years, campaigners have fought with some success to reduce | :05:47. | :05:50. | |
abstraction at the Axford Borehole. More recently even its owner, | :05:50. | :05:55. | |
Thames Water, has admitted the need to take out less. | :05:55. | :05:57. | |
However, in order to cut abstraction and still get water to | :05:57. | :06:00. | |
customers in Swindon, Thames says it needs to extend an existing pipe | :06:00. | :06:10. | |
from a local reservoir, at a cost �10m. But there's a snag. | :06:10. | :06:13. | |
Under the terms of its licence, Thames Water is entitled to | :06:13. | :06:20. | |
compensation if it's asked to stop abstracting. Compensation of �10m. | :06:20. | :06:23. | |
And it's up to the Environment Agency, and thus the taxpayer, to | :06:23. | :06:33. | |
:06:33. | :06:33. | ||
come up with the money. It is quite a lot of money so would take a | :06:33. | :06:37. | |
while to accumulate. Let's be clear, we are all working as hard as we | :06:37. | :06:42. | |
can to get this is achieved as quickly as possible. Anyone who has | :06:42. | :06:46. | |
been involved in the legal processes will realise they take | :06:46. | :06:50. | |
time. We are working as hard as we can to get it done as quickly as | :06:50. | :06:53. | |
possible. If they're struggling to find the | :06:53. | :07:00. | |
money, perhaps Thames Water can help them out. Unfortunately we are | :07:00. | :07:06. | |
a regional monopoly regulated tightly and we cannot just say, we | :07:06. | :07:09. | |
want �10 million a more put everyone has built up. Although it | :07:09. | :07:13. | |
wouldn't be much across every customer, only about a penny a | :07:13. | :07:17. | |
month, but we still cannot do that because every penny counts. | :07:17. | :07:20. | |
So, no solution there either. But with the river in drought, the | :07:20. | :07:23. | |
stalemate between Thames Water and the Environment Agency is starting | :07:23. | :07:26. | |
to wear a bit thin. Perhaps the government can step in. | :07:27. | :07:30. | |
Richard Benyon is the Natural Environment Minister. I'm meeting | :07:30. | :07:39. | |
him where the Kennet goes through his constituency. The solution to | :07:39. | :07:43. | |
this that all parties agree on is a new pipe, but all this is taking | :07:43. | :07:49. | |
far too long. Surely you can sort it out now? We want to see this | :07:49. | :07:55. | |
dealt with. The Axford abstraction is the big problem in this river. I | :07:55. | :07:59. | |
have to take a broad view across these issues and across all | :07:59. | :08:07. | |
catchments. In my role as local MP, I want to see the axe third | :08:07. | :08:11. | |
abstractions sorted as quickly as possible. There is no lack of will | :08:11. | :08:15. | |
in government to achieve that. In July, a change in the law comes | :08:15. | :08:17. | |
into force which could stop Thames Water's abstraction without paying | :08:17. | :08:20. | |
them compensation. In the meantime, even with last month's record | :08:20. | :08:30. | |
rainfall, the river is still under threat. If the drought got worse | :08:30. | :08:34. | |
and the Kennet got dry air, which you reduce the amount you are | :08:34. | :08:39. | |
abstracting from Axford? We would reduce it as much as we could, but | :08:39. | :08:43. | |
there would be a point at which we couldn't because we have a duty to | :08:43. | :08:52. | |
supply water. So you would have to keep taking water? Yes we would. | :08:52. | :08:56. | |
have bought due to the River Kennet and this is where the water that | :08:56. | :09:01. | |
you drink comes from. Because there has been a drought, take a look for | :09:01. | :09:05. | |
yourselves. I am back with the Warren family | :09:05. | :09:10. | |
and as promised, I am showing them the source of their drinking water. | :09:10. | :09:15. | |
Although there is not really much water to see. I am actually shocks | :09:15. | :09:22. | |
over it all. It looks like you won't get any water from it. I am | :09:22. | :09:28. | |
quite aware, but it would make me even more aware. Even now, it makes | :09:28. | :09:38. | |
:09:38. | :09:38. | ||
you think twice. How careful everyone needs to be. Even if the | :09:38. | :09:42. | |
warrants do manage to use less water, taking it from the Kennet is | :09:42. | :09:48. | |
unsustainable and until a realistic alternative is in place, the impact | :09:48. | :09:55. | |
on this river will not get any better. | :09:55. | :09:58. | |
Coming up we will have a full weather forecast with Ian Ferguson | :09:58. | :10:03. | |
and we are heading off to southern Europe where they know a thing or | :10:03. | :10:07. | |
two about droughts. Look at the waterline in this reservoir. Look | :10:07. | :10:13. | |
how high it should be and how low it is. | :10:13. | :10:18. | |
Here in the West we have been on official drought status for just | :10:18. | :10:22. | |
over two weeks. While it is clear this is due to a lack of rain, what | :10:22. | :10:28. | |
is less clear is why this has happened. BBC meteorologist, myth | :10:28. | :10:38. | |
:10:38. | :10:49. | ||
Nick Miller, explains what is going The Lake District is England's | :10:49. | :10:53. | |
wettest place and looking below, there were drought is the last | :10:53. | :10:57. | |
thing that comes to mind. There is rain rich land and reservoirs with | :10:57. | :11:02. | |
billions of litres of water. So with all of this on an island where | :11:02. | :11:06. | |
it has not stopped raining for the past few weeks, how come so much of | :11:06. | :11:10. | |
England is in drought? The Met Office is now looking into | :11:10. | :11:15. | |
what is behind this change in our climate. The first place they are | :11:15. | :11:19. | |
looking is the jet stream but carries a rain bearing weather | :11:19. | :11:23. | |
across the Atlantic. The jet stream is displace that little bit further | :11:23. | :11:29. | |
north. By the time whether France pushed further south into England, | :11:29. | :11:32. | |
it is so short of rainfall and running into higher pressure and | :11:32. | :11:40. | |
not doing the job that we want them to do. At this time of year, we are | :11:40. | :11:46. | |
competing with nature for water. Everything around us is embarked on | :11:46. | :11:49. | |
spring growth. You do not get England's green and pleasant land | :11:50. | :11:54. | |
without it, but whilst everything around us turns green, what you do | :11:54. | :11:59. | |
not see in some parts of the country is even more important and | :11:59. | :12:02. | |
that is underground. It is the water underground, not | :12:02. | :12:09. | |
reservoirs, that supplies 75% of the most populated parts of England. | :12:09. | :12:16. | |
150 miles south-east of Windermere and I am in drowsed territory. I am | :12:16. | :12:18. | |
visiting the National Geological Survey in Nottingham where they | :12:18. | :12:23. | |
monitor the level of England's ground water. Using data from | :12:23. | :12:27. | |
thousands of boreholes, they have created an underground map of | :12:27. | :12:32. | |
Britain. The areas of green, the chalk, becoming a peer into | :12:32. | :12:39. | |
Lincolnshire and look -- Yorkshire and the south-east, it is a really | :12:39. | :12:43. | |
important aquifer. That only gets recharged by rainfall in the winter | :12:43. | :12:48. | |
and we have had to relatively dry winters so we have not had the | :12:48. | :12:53. | |
recharge we would expect. Ground water levels have remained normal, | :12:53. | :12:58. | |
but as you move south east, they have dropped in volume by one-third. | :12:58. | :13:03. | |
In the last couple of years, only four months have been wetter than | :13:03. | :13:08. | |
normal, including April just gone which delivered record rain. To | :13:08. | :13:12. | |
really find out how low our ground water stocks are, last week I | :13:12. | :13:19. | |
joined Andy Mackenzie and his team to do a survey. This is the South | :13:19. | :13:24. | |
Downs. In drought, one of the driest parts of England and below | :13:24. | :13:28. | |
me the most important source of ground water, the chalk aquifer. | :13:28. | :13:34. | |
Today we find out how far we have to go down to find water. The chalk | :13:34. | :13:38. | |
aquifer is a giant pressurise sponge full of water which the | :13:39. | :13:42. | |
Victorians tap with Wells like this one. | :13:42. | :13:47. | |
The water would normally be about 20 metres below ground level. | :13:47. | :13:52. | |
This is the exciting bit, how far down are we? It is looking | :13:52. | :13:57. | |
promising. I can see a reflection at the bottom of the well, but we | :13:57. | :14:02. | |
are only 30 metres below we started. Before long we pass the point where | :14:02. | :14:07. | |
we would normally find water. one of the interesting things is | :14:07. | :14:11. | |
that you are seeing very dry walls. If there was any recharge happening, | :14:11. | :14:17. | |
you would see moisture or all the walls would be listening. They are | :14:17. | :14:21. | |
not. Even though it has been pouring with rain, that rain has | :14:21. | :14:28. | |
not made a jot of difference? it has not. It would take weeks or | :14:28. | :14:35. | |
months for the water to infiltrate, if it did. But it will not. OK, we | :14:35. | :14:42. | |
are just coming up to 34.4. That is the surface of the water. How does | :14:42. | :14:47. | |
it compare with how low it was before? We have 180 years of record, | :14:47. | :14:53. | |
this is the 5th or 6th driest we have seen it in April. Pretty low. | :14:53. | :14:58. | |
The last drought was in 1976 where one dry winter was followed by a | :14:59. | :15:04. | |
hot summer. Now we are saying save water. People were forced to queue | :15:04. | :15:08. | |
in the streets to get water from standpipes. This drought is | :15:08. | :15:13. | |
different, it is not hot and sunny, it is pouring with rain and yet we | :15:13. | :15:17. | |
are told we could be in doubt until Christmas. No one is saying that | :15:17. | :15:21. | |
this rain is not making a difference, of course it is. We | :15:21. | :15:26. | |
have had one of our wettest April's, but that rain has still not reached | :15:26. | :15:32. | |
where many of us get our water from, the aquifers. | :15:32. | :15:36. | |
What the Victorians started were soon expanded to exploit the | :15:36. | :15:41. | |
natural resources of the chalk aquifer. This is Friston aquifer, | :15:41. | :15:46. | |
operated by South West Water. Supplying 2.1 million customers | :15:46. | :15:51. | |
from pumping stations. Kevin, down there, that is so | :15:51. | :15:56. | |
precious water. How low are the aquifers? We are in a serious | :15:56. | :16:03. | |
situation. Our underground aquifers of very low. Rovers are flying in | :16:03. | :16:07. | |
high levels and people think everything is OK, but that is not | :16:07. | :16:11. | |
the case. We have pumps lower down to levels they have never been to | :16:11. | :16:21. | |
:16:21. | :16:22. | ||
The level of the church and her groundwater is a third lower than | :16:22. | :16:28. | |
it should be after two dry winters in a row. We have, long way from | :16:28. | :16:32. | |
the Lake District and it seems we're even further from that | :16:32. | :16:37. | |
soaking rain that has been falling above ground. But down here, it is | :16:37. | :16:42. | |
what a rain that matters and we do not -- if we do not get enough next | :16:42. | :16:50. | |
winter, we are all heading into the unknown. | :16:50. | :16:57. | |
With those two dry winters behind us, all eyes are on the third one. | :16:57. | :17:03. | |
It could lead the country is facing severe water shortages. So how | :17:03. | :17:10. | |
prepared are we? David Willey has been to Spain to see how the deal | :17:10. | :17:20. | |
:17:20. | :17:20. | ||
was such bright weather. This church has stood here for more | :17:20. | :17:25. | |
than 500 years. But I should not even be able to be here because | :17:25. | :17:31. | |
this is at a reservoir. That spire is usually submerged and the 1000 - | :17:32. | :17:36. | |
- under thousands of tons of water. The reason why it is so dry is | :17:36. | :17:46. | |
:17:46. | :17:46. | ||
because Thames Water is suffering from its worst drought. Look how | :17:46. | :17:51. | |
high it should be. Before those trees is where that water should be. | :17:51. | :17:59. | |
That is incredible. Can Thames Water -- and Spain give us a look | :17:59. | :18:07. | |
into the future? The taps and Barcelona almost ran | :18:07. | :18:13. | |
dry and they were forced to share Pen supplies from France. Its 3.5 | :18:13. | :18:17. | |
million residents have had to completely change the attitudes | :18:17. | :18:22. | |
towards water. It is incredible that something as simple as water | :18:22. | :18:28. | |
had to be transported in in tankers into Barcelona. What was that like? | :18:28. | :18:34. | |
His it is a first as far as I know. Luckily it did not have to be | :18:35. | :18:39. | |
carried through on a massive scale on a long time. Before that there | :18:39. | :18:43. | |
was a sensation that it was not going to be easy. If the drought | :18:43. | :18:48. | |
was going to last far any longer, there would have to be rations of | :18:48. | :18:57. | |
water. How has affected your future? We realised how precious | :18:57. | :19:03. | |
water was. We had emergency measures. The children talk up | :19:03. | :19:09. | |
about it a lot in school. They had an easier time adapting turning the | :19:09. | :19:16. | |
tap off. Through simple measures like turning off taps, having time | :19:17. | :19:20. | |
showers and teaching at what a conservation in the schools, | :19:20. | :19:25. | |
Barcelona is on his way to be one of the leading cities have been | :19:25. | :19:31. | |
saving water. People here use just 107 litres a day, compared to 150 | :19:31. | :19:37. | |
in the UK. Across the city, there have tried to use whatever showers | :19:37. | :19:42. | |
to flush toilets as well as a recycling water in Barcelona's | :19:42. | :19:46. | |
famous fountains. This will not be the first of the last time | :19:47. | :19:49. | |
Barcelona faces drought and that experience four years ago in | :19:49. | :19:53. | |
Barcelona forced everyone to change the way they think about water on | :19:53. | :20:00. | |
every level. And this place was the answer - they built this mass of | :20:00. | :20:06. | |
desalination plant and it is the largest in Europe. By taking sea | :20:06. | :20:10. | |
water from the Mediterranean, the plant can produce 118 million | :20:10. | :20:14. | |
litres of fresh water every day. But that is still only a fifth of | :20:14. | :20:22. | |
the city's needs. So it is used as a stop gap when reservoirs are low. | :20:23. | :20:27. | |
This system is much more secure because of this plant but this is | :20:27. | :20:30. | |
not total security. The plant allows this kind to function | :20:30. | :20:40. | |
:20:40. | :20:43. | ||
between rainy periods. If there is a bright, the plant helps. Spain is | :20:43. | :20:47. | |
a world leader in the technology but it is not a perfect solution. | :20:47. | :20:53. | |
What are produced here is very expensive and the Barcelona plant | :20:53. | :21:00. | |
uses enough energy to power a small town. Unlike Spain, this is where | :21:00. | :21:04. | |
we use most of our water, generating electricity in our power | :21:04. | :21:09. | |
stations. Most of the rest, around 40%, is used in our homes and | :21:09. | :21:13. | |
gardens but the trouble is we used to much, more than any other | :21:13. | :21:17. | |
developed countries. As head of water resources at the Environment | :21:17. | :21:22. | |
Agency, it is Trevor Bishop's job to find a solution. So is turning | :21:22. | :21:27. | |
salt water into freshwater the answer? We have one large | :21:28. | :21:32. | |
desalination Mark -- plant near London. I think the likelihood of | :21:32. | :21:37. | |
seeing more of these plants in the next 10 or 20 years is quite high. | :21:37. | :21:41. | |
But we do not want to rely and desalination. It is very expensive, | :21:41. | :21:47. | |
it produces a lot of card and so it is not good for the environment. | :21:47. | :21:52. | |
Here, what gets me down here, is that a option for water companies, | :21:53. | :22:00. | |
to transfer water to drier parts of the country. The Victorians started | :22:00. | :22:07. | |
this as a way to manage water. In the future, moving water around | :22:07. | :22:12. | |
even more, grating connectivity and the networks is going to be part of | :22:12. | :22:18. | |
the answer, but not that all answer. Are we talking about a national | :22:18. | :22:24. | |
grid of water? As far as electricity is concerned, it | :22:24. | :22:27. | |
somewhere is short of electricity, we do not get blackouts and other | :22:27. | :22:31. | |
parts of the country. For we are not talking about a national grid | :22:31. | :22:35. | |
in the same way as we look out gas and electricity. What there is | :22:35. | :22:40. | |
heavy and expensive to move. If we have a big mane of what it from the | :22:40. | :22:45. | |
North of England to the size of England, we do not want to rely on | :22:45. | :22:50. | |
moving around the water -- around the country. It desalination has | :22:50. | :22:54. | |
problems and we should not rely and moving water, what is going to | :22:54. | :22:59. | |
happen if we have a third dry winter? It is difficult to say but | :22:59. | :23:05. | |
we would be no bad place. I do not think we have ever worked out the | :23:05. | :23:10. | |
consequences of three dry winters. But you would be expecting measures | :23:10. | :23:13. | |
to try and conserve water which would be dramatic. There would be | :23:13. | :23:17. | |
standpipes in the street, people's water supply would be cut off, they | :23:17. | :23:21. | |
would have to take containers down to the standpipes. We do not know | :23:21. | :23:27. | |
the numbers involved, but it could be tens of thousands. As far as I | :23:27. | :23:30. | |
am aware, there is no strategic national plan to deal with three | :23:30. | :23:34. | |
dry winters and a role. I would like to be Provan wrong. I would | :23:35. | :23:38. | |
like to think we would have a plan to deal with it, I do not know if | :23:38. | :23:43. | |
we have one. I think our plan is based on hope that it will rain. | :23:43. | :23:48. | |
Hope is a very poor strategy for a risky and important business. So is | :23:48. | :23:52. | |
there a strategy are not? Caroline Spelman is the Environment | :23:52. | :23:56. | |
Secretary. Yes, because we have to have contingency plans. Drought is | :23:56. | :24:01. | |
a natural phenomenon. We have seen this coming and we have been | :24:01. | :24:05. | |
planning for it. What we are putting in place other measures to | :24:05. | :24:09. | |
deal with that. The temporary restrictions on non-essential uses | :24:09. | :24:14. | |
of water in a domestic setting is something that we planned to do in | :24:14. | :24:18. | |
order to conserve water and make sure we do not have to move to more | :24:18. | :24:23. | |
stringent restrictions later. 3.3 billion litres of water which | :24:23. | :24:27. | |
is a quarter of our water is lost every day. Do you think that is | :24:27. | :24:32. | |
acceptable? Away need to encourage the water companies to reduce | :24:32. | :24:41. | |
leakage. -- we need to. She the targets be more stringent? It is | :24:41. | :24:45. | |
the economic regulator that says these targets, that at least are a | :24:45. | :24:49. | |
challenge to the industry to meet. The Government is also pushing | :24:49. | :24:53. | |
water companies to do more to collect up -- connect up supplies | :24:54. | :24:58. | |
across the country. But she says we need to think differently about | :24:58. | :25:03. | |
water and how we use it. When you got a dry country and you explain | :25:03. | :25:07. | |
to them in a country like ours we used drinking water for everything. | :25:07. | :25:11. | |
We wash our closed end drinking water. We wash up with drinking | :25:11. | :25:16. | |
water. They are sometimes surprised by that. Can you guarantee that if | :25:16. | :25:20. | |
we get that there dry winter we will not have water rationing and | :25:20. | :25:24. | |
standpipes in the street? I am not deluded into thinking I can tell | :25:24. | :25:28. | |
you how much rain we are going to get! It is far too early to tell | :25:28. | :25:34. | |
yet whether we are going to get the wet winter we do need. But where it | :25:34. | :25:38. | |
is most unlikely we will have standpipes this year, if we have | :25:38. | :25:43. | |
another dry winter, that becomes more likely. He then the recent | :25:44. | :25:48. | |
heavy rain and floods in the UK, Tocher standpipes may sound | :25:48. | :25:52. | |
extraordinary but as they discovered here in Spain, the world | :25:52. | :25:58. | |
is changing. Climate change and an expanding population means demand | :25:58. | :26:02. | |
for water is set to increase. Pretty soon we will all have to | :26:02. | :26:06. | |
think about drinking water as the pressures and scarce natural | :26:06. | :26:15. | |
resource it really is. David Whiteley was some options | :26:15. | :26:24. | |
open to the future. Before we go, with the weather for the next five | :26:24. | :26:26. | |
days. Hello. As you been hearing, we must | :26:26. | :26:30. | |
not confuse the issues of short- term heavy rain and the problems | :26:30. | :26:34. | |
that has been causing with a longer term problems of the drought. | :26:34. | :26:38. | |
Speaking of heavy rain, we also have a threat of more of that | :26:38. | :26:42. | |
through tonight and into the first half of tomorrow. As we get through | :26:42. | :26:45. | |
the tail end of the week and the weekend, some cloud around and it | :26:46. | :26:50. | |
could turn cooler. Some rain about at times but Bank Holiday Monday it | :26:50. | :26:54. | |
likely to be the wettest spell of the weekend. The Met Office has yet | :26:54. | :27:00. | |
another yellow warning out for us the threat of heavy rain tonight. | :27:00. | :27:10. | |
Write down the M4 corridor. -- all the way down. Potentially another | :27:10. | :27:18. | |
20 are 30 mm of rain falling there. Here is the reasons why it. We have | :27:18. | :27:24. | |
is area of warm air coming in. That is moving across us with an area of | :27:24. | :27:31. | |
heavy rain. It will be embedded heavy rain. It will be embedded | :27:31. | :27:38. | |
with some thunder. It will turn cooler. The orange and yellow get | :27:38. | :27:44. | |
swept aside as we get through their bank holiday Monday, replaced by | :27:44. | :27:49. | |
the blue, temperatures falling back to around ten Celsius. Let's look | :27:49. | :27:55. | |
at how that hard stacks up, tomorrow the heavy rain easing away | :27:55. | :28:01. | |
as the day wears off. Cooler than today. For Friday there should be | :28:01. | :28:07. | |
some patchy and light rain, perhaps some showers on the south coast. In | :28:07. | :28:15. | |
between that, it should be dry. As we get on -- into overnight and | :28:15. | :28:21. | |
Saturday, it will improve later but will be windy air. Sunday looks | :28:21. | :28:27. | |
better all round, but we see the chance of heavier rain on Sunday. - | :28:27. | :28:33. |