Water Neutrality in the Sussex North Water Resource Zone

On 14 September 2021, Natural England issued a Position Statement for planning applications within the Sussex North Water Resource Zone.

Information collected by Natural England shows that water abstraction for drinking water supplies may be having a negative impact on the wildlife sites in the Arun Valley. They have advised that any new development that takes place must demonstrate that it will not add to the risk of this detrimental impact.

Natural England’s Position Statement for Applications within the Sussex North Water Supply Zone

Southern Water has a Water Resources Management Plan (WRMP) which sets out how we will maintain water supplies to customers and protect the environment in the future. We are delivering schemes in our current plan (covering the period from 2020-70) to provide additional drought resilience whilst investigating whether some of our abstractions are having an impact upon the environment. In the Sussex North Water Resource Zone, whilst these investigations are ongoing, Natural England have stated that Local Planning Authorities must ensure that all new development which takes place is water neutral so as not to exacerbate any impacts which might be occurring.

Water neutrality is defined as development that takes place which does not increase the rate of water abstraction for drinking water supplies above existing levels.

Further details are provided in the Water Neutrality advice note.

The Position Statement affects developments within the Horsham District Council, Crawley Borough Council, part of Chichester District Council, parts of the South Downs National Park and West Sussex County Council.

To identify if your development site would be within the Sussex North Water Resource Zone please use the interactive map which is available on West Sussex County Council website: Water Neutrality - West Sussex County Council

We have produced a set of downloadable water neutrality boundary map extracts, one extract per Local Authority who are impacted by water neutrality in Sussex North. The extracts are a subset of the water neutrality boundary map available on the West Sussex County Council Website.

Download boundary map extracts

**Please note, the water neutrality map hosted by West Sussex County Council is the definitive map and any file used should be cross referenced with this.

If you are considering submitting a planning application within the Sussex North Resource Zone you will need to consult with your Local Planning Authority (LPA) and submit a Water Neutrality statement which demonstrates ‘water neutrality’.

For information on how to plan your development please see our Developing & building section.

How to achieve Water Neutrality?

Waterwise published a review of Water Neutrality in the UK (2021) document which gives some guidance on how water neutrality can be achieved. More information can be found on their website:

Water neutrality can be achieved by developers building significant water efficiency measures into new development and by providing offsetting to reduce water consumption from existing development. It is the developer’s responsibility to demonstrate to the Local Planning Authority (LPA) deliverable water neutrality for their site.

The Waterwise guidance recommends applying the following hierarchy:

Research and studies:

Crawley Borough Council has commissioned a number studies related to the issue of serious water stress and supply; these include:

Gatwick Sub Region Water Cycle (August 2020)
Addendum to Water Cycle Study (January 2021)
JBA Part A –Individual Local Authority Areas
JBA Part B – The Local Authorities across the Water Resource Zone in combination
JBA Part C - Mitigation Strategy

For the most up to date information on the local authorities’ approach and links to the above studies visit Crawley Borough Council’s website: Water neutrality in Crawley | Crawley GOV

Southern Water activity on water resources, supply and demand:

Southern Water has developed a Water Resources Management Plan (WRMP) and Drought Plan.

Target 100 is our industry-leading demand reduction programme to reduce water demand through efficiency and changes in the way we all use our water supply.

If you have any queries or concerns regarding Water Neutrality in the Sussex North region, please email us at: [email protected]

To join our mailing list to receive monthly Water Neutrality newsletters for developers and invitations to attend our quarterly events to share progress with our commitments and exchange ideas, please email: [email protected]

If you would like to find out more about our Developer Services team and events including our annual developer day event, please email: [email protected]

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