Veolia Water Projects Ltd (VWPL) is consulting on its draft Drought Management Plan 2027.
The plan explains how we would monitor and manage drought conditions in the Tidworth Water Resource Zone (WRZ), including the actions we may take to help maintain public water supplies, manage demand, protect the environment and communicate with customers and stakeholders during drought.
Our current Drought Plan was published in 2022. This draft Drought Management Plan 2027 updates our approach to reflect current water resources, operational arrangements, environmental considerations, and regulatory requirements.
The consultation opens on 28 May 2026 and will run for 10 weeks, closing on 6 August 2026.
We welcome comments from customers, statutory consultees, regulators, local stakeholders and other interested parties.
Comments should be sent to the Secretary of State by email at: [email protected]
Please include “Veolia Water Projects Ltd Drought Management Plan 2027 consultation” in the subject line.
Please also copy your response to VWPL email at: [email protected]
If required, any representations by post should be sent to:
Drought Plan Consultation
Defra
Drought
Seacole, 2 Marsham Street
London SW1P 4DF
The consultation documents include the draft plan and supporting annexes. However, on national security grounds, the following information has been redacted or withheld from the published consultation documents:
● Borehole information and the VWPL network map in the Main document;
● The Borehole Specification section in Annex 2 (Drought Vulnerability Assessment);
● Annex 5 (Tidworth Abstraction Licence Groundwater Modelling Impact Assessment).
A Statement of Public Consultation has been published alongside the draft plan to explain the general nature of the redacted or withheld information.
Requests to inspect withheld or unredacted material will be considered on a case-by-case basis, subject to appropriate security requirements. To request access, please email: [email protected]
The current Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) Screening Report concludes that a full SEA is not required because the plan is unlikely to have significant environmental effects. The Declaration and the Statement of Reasons have been included in the Statement of Public Consultation and in Annex 4 (main document). The SEA Screening Report is currently undergoing Statutory Consultation and we will update the final determination. If you want to see a full version of this document, please email: [email protected]
After the consultation closes, we will review all representations received by 6 August 2026. We will then prepare and publish a Statement of Response (SoR) explaining how the comments have been considered and whether any changes have been made to the Plan.
The Secretary of State will consider the SoR and may issue further directions before the final Drought Management Plan 2027 is published.
The draft Drought Management Plan 2027 documents are available to view and download on this page.