Fast-tracking water resilience: the UK’s planning revolution enables new reservoirs
In the flat fenlands of eastern England, a vast new reservoir is taking shape on the drawing board. If built, it won’t just store water for 250,000 homes – its 500 hectares of planned wetlands and parkland could draw hundreds of thousands of visitors, transforming farm fields into a haven for people and nature. This proposed Fens Reservoir, slated for completion in the 2030s, is one of the first major water supply reservoirs approved in the UK in over 30 years. It also headlines an ambitious wave of water infrastructure projects now moving forward under Britain’s unique fast-track planning regime. From new “mega-reservoirs” to cross-country pipelines, the UK is embracing innovative, centrally-coordinated solutions to fend off future droughts – while striving to balance national water resilience goals with local community and environmental priorities.
A new era of water infrastructure driven by urgency
After decades of relative quiet, the UK water sector is racing to build again. The push comes as climate change and population growth tighten their grip on the country’s water supplies. Recent droughts have strained aging infrastructure, exposing the lack of storage capacity and leaving reservoirs at worryingly low levels. The national Environment Agency projects a freshwater shortfall of nearly 5 billion litres per day by 2055 – roughly a third of current usage. This stark forecast, alongside rising public and political alarm over water scarcity, has created a consensus that bold investments can’t be put off any longer.
The UK is embarking on its largest water infrastructure programme in decades, responding to climate change, population growth, and a projected 5 billion-litre-per-day supply shortfall by 2055
The result is the biggest programme of new water infrastructure that Britain has seen in a generation: nationally or regionally significant schemes known as Strategic Resource Options (SROs). In spring 2025, UK ministers greenlit the first new large reservoirs since 1992. Two reservoir proposals – one in East Anglia’s Fens and one in Lincolnshire – were swiftly designated as “nationally significant” and told to proceed, to secure water for over 750,000 homes in England’s most water-stressed regions. They are just the beginning. Water companies, spurred by regulators and government, have drawn up plans through 2050 for a suite of major schemes to boost supply and resilience. These include new storage, new sources, and better links between regions, for example:
- 10 new reservoirs and 1 reservoir enlargement
- 9 desalination projects
- 7 large-scale water recycling projects (advanced treatment to reuse wastewater)
- Multiple internal and inter-company transfers – pipelines and canals to move water from wetter areas to drier ones
This expansive strategy reflects a mix of traditional engineering and innovative solutions. Besides reservoirs, more novel options like desalination on the coast and recycling water within cities are being pursued to diversify supplies. Crucially, many of these projects are cross-border and collaborative – for instance, a proposed pipeline to transfer water from the wetter River Severn basin to the drier Thames basin, and a giant “South East Strategic Reservoir” near Abingdon, Oxfordshire that would serve several company regions at once. This coordinated approach marks a departure from the past, when individual utilities largely handled their own needs. Now, climate change has made water scarcity a national concern, requiring bigger, interlinked infrastructure – and a planning system capable of delivering it.
The NSIP/DCO regime: planning at national scale
To enable this burst of development, the UK has turned to a specialized planning framework designed for Nationally Significant Infrastructure Projects (NSIPs). Under the NSIP regime, introduced by the Planning Act 2008, projects deemed crucial to the nation bypass normal local planning approval and instead seek a single all-in-one consent known as a Development Consent Order (DCO). A DCO, granted by central government, effectively grants permission for the whole project (covering land use, environmental consents, etc.), streamlining what used to require many separate approvals.
A streamlined national planning regime is accelerating delivery, using fast-track consents to approve projects such as major reservoirs and water transfers
Qualifying as a water NSIP requires meeting certain size thresholds that were broadened in recent years to capture the big projects now needed. Since 2019, any new reservoir holding over 30 million cubic meters of water or providing at least 80 million litres per day of supply is automatically treated as nationally significant (the previous volume threshold was only 10 million m³). Similarly, water transfer schemes that can move 80+ million litres per day between regions meet the NSIP definition, as do large desalination plants. These criteria ensure that truly large-scale, strategic water projects come under the NSIP process. Even if a scheme falls slightly below the thresholds, the government can use discretionary powers (a “Section 35 direction”) to elevate it into the NSIP regime if it’s deemed of national importance. This means innovative but not gigantic projects – say, a cutting-edge water recycling facility – can still get the benefits of the streamlined DCO path.
How does the DCO process work? It is often described as a “one-stop shop” for infrastructure approval. Instead of applying to a local county or city council, a developer submits its application to the national Planning Inspectorate. There’s a formal pre-application phase where extensive consultation is required, and a public examination once submitted, led by an independent Inspector who issues a recommendation to the Secretary of State for a final decision to grant the DCO or not. In total, the process from submission to decision usually takes about a year – far faster and more predictable than traditional public inquiries that large projects once faced.
Upstream of the NSIP/DCO regime sits the Regulatory Assistance Project for Infrastructure Delivery (RAPID), which identifies and de-risks major water infrastructure before planning consent is sought. Led by Ofwat, the Environment Agency and the Drinking Water Inspectorate, the programme aligns regulators on the need and funding for major Strategic Resource Options (SROs), such as reservoirs and transfers, so that DCO examinations can focus on how projects are delivered rather than whether they are needed.
The National Policy Statement (NPS) for Water Resources Infrastructure, finalized in 2023, provides the policy blueprint for how these DCO decisions are made. It explicitly pre-approves the “need case” for projects that have been included in an approved Water Resources Management Plan (WRMP), reflecting the strategic assessments already undertaken through RAPID and the water resources planning process. This allows the DCO process to focus on delivery and impacts, rather than reopening questions of need.
An ambitious pipeline of projects takes shape
Armed with this clearer path, England’s water companies – working together in regional groups – have lined up a roster of strategic projects to boost drought resilience by mid-century. At the forefront are the new reservoirs. The Lincolnshire project, led by Anglian Water, will create a massive raw-water lake south of Sleaford, yielding up to 166 million litres per day for the surrounding region. Meanwhile, the Fens Reservoir (a partnership between Anglian and Cambridge Water) is designed to supply about 87 million litres per day to one of the driest parts of the UK. Both reservoirs are planned to come online in the 2030s, and represent an investment of over £4 billion.
Following close behind is the South East Strategic Reservoir (SESRO, now known as White Horse Reservoir) in Oxfordshire – essentially a giant new lake near Abingdon to bolster water supply across London and the Home Counties. This project, proposed by Thames Water, would be of similar scale (potentially 150+ billion litres storage). If approved, SESRO could secure water for up to 14 million people in the Southeast, a region under severe long-term stress. In the Havant Thicket area of Hampshire, construction is already underway on a smaller reservoir – a joint venture between Portsmouth Water and Southern Water – aiming to protect fragile chalk stream ecosystems by storing winter river flows for summer use.
Transfers and interconnected networks are another cornerstone of the plan. One high-profile proposal is the Severn-to-Thames Transfer: a pipeline (or restored canal route) that would send water from the River Severn eastwards to the River Thames basin, potentially supplying London during droughts. This complex scheme is being developed jointly by several companies (Thames Water, Severn Trent, United Utilities) and involves coordination with multiple regions. If it goes ahead, it would be unprecedented in scale for the UK – effectively a man-made river linking two of the nation’s largest catchments. Another proposed project, the Grand Union Canal Transfer, would move treated water from the Severn Trent region in the Midlands towards London and the South East, using existing canal corridors and new pipeline infrastructure to redistribute surplus supplies.
Desalination and reuse projects are also in the mix. For example, Anglian Water is advancing a series of large-scale desalination options along the North Sea coast, including proposals at Holland-on-Sea, Mablethorpe and Bacton, to provide climate-resilient coastal supply. In southern England, Southern Water is advancing a water recycling scheme (Hampshire Water Transfer and Water Recycling Project) that would take highly treated wastewater and store it in an environmental buffer (the Havant Thicket Reservoir) for later reuse as drinking water – a first-of-its-kind project at scale in the UK.
It’s worth noting that funding for these mega-projects is being addressed alongside planning. The economic regulator Ofwat has already earmarked £2 billion of early development funding for strategic supply schemes in the current 5-year cycle. This money helps companies perform detailed studies, design work, and stakeholder engagement so that DCO applications are robust when submitted.
Balancing national needs with local voices and nature
Environmental protection is built into the planning system, with major water projects required to deliver biodiversity net gain and address local impacts
Centralizing and accelerating the approval of reservoirs and pipelines is not without controversy. Water may be a national issue, but these projects still have very local impacts – flooding farmland, altering landscapes, and raising concerns in nearby communities. A key challenge for the UK’s approach is maintaining public trust and environmental stewardship. To address this, the NSIP/DCO regime builds in multiple safeguards and opportunities for input, aiming to strike a balance between streamlining and scrutiny.
The UK’s planning regime also puts environmental protection front and centre. Under the new Water NPS, any NSIP must not only avoid undue environmental harm, it should proactively enhance the natural environment with net gains for biodiversity. In fact, starting in 2025, infrastructure developers are mandated to deliver at least a 10% net gain in biodiversity as part of their projects, meaning the habitat and wildlife opportunities created by the scheme should measurably exceed what is lost. The water companies have embraced this concept in their reservoir designs.
Of course, not everyone is convinced by the government’s fast-tracking ethos. Some local advocacy groups remain opposed to specific projects. Environmental NGOs, while supportive of new storage to protect rivers in principle, keep pressure on to ensure robust environmental safeguards and transparency in decision-making. The big question is whether the “streamlined” process still allows enough time and rigor to get these complex projects right. Officials argue that the DCO system, with its fixed timelines, can actually provide more certainty and thoroughness: all issues are aired within the examination’s scope, rather than being dragged out over years of sequential hearings and court challenges.
A national governance model for a global water challenge
As countries worldwide grapple with water scarcity and the infrastructure needed to combat it, the UK’s approach offers an interesting case study. In essence, Britain is attempting to treat water infrastructure with the same national importance as energy grids, highways, or railways – sectors where central planning and fast-track permits are common. By elevating critical water projects to the national stage, the UK aims to break the logjam that often hinders big water works (whether that’s local political pushback, planning delays, or funding uncertainty).
If this approach is successful, by the late 2030s England will have a network of new reservoirs, interconnected pipelines, and advanced treatment plants fortifying its water supply against climate extremes. Equally, these projects will have to earn their social license by creating local value – be it new parks, jobs, or wildlife habitats – in addition to securing water. The balancing act between national resilience and local impact is delicate, but the innovative NSIP/DCO planning regime is the tool the UK is betting on to manage it. The lesson is that meeting 21st-century water challenges may require 21st-century governance models. The UK’s centralized yet consultative approach to permitting essential water assets is a bold example, blending strong top-down direction with bottom-up engagement. As the climate throws more swings of drought and deluge at us, this kind of integrated, rapid-response planning may well become a template for others seeking to ensure water for generations to come.