Jersey water supplies remain under pressure despite end of drought

Jersey may still face hosepipe restrictions despite recent rainfall bringing an end to the island's officially declared drought.

A drought was declared last week following 15 consecutive days without rain. While rainfall on Tuesday ended the drought, Jersey Water says it remains concerned about water supplies after a prolonged period of hot and dry weather.

The utility has said it is preparing to use its desalination plant, which can convert seawater into drinking water, if reservoir levels fall further.

Reservoirs are currently around 65% full, below the 77% average recorded for this point in August over the past decade.

Mark Bowden, Jersey Water's head of water resilience, said the island was not yet facing restrictions but warned that the situation could change.

"Currently we are not in a hosepipe ban, and the desalination plant is not in use," he said.

"However, we are closer than we were at the start of the month to turning the desalination plant on and may yet need to introduce a hosepipe ban."

Jersey Water uses historical reservoir levels and drought data to determine when additional measures are required.

Mr Bowden said the island's reservoirs have a limited capacity and, even when completely full, provide around 120 days of water supply.

"We watch it very closely, we monitor the levels continuously and we are very close to the desalination plant start line and we're also quite close to moving into hosepipe restrictions, but we're not quite there yet," he said.

The utility also warned that reservoir levels can continue to fall well into the autumn, with October often seeing some of the lowest levels of the year.

Mr Bowden said more rainfall would be needed before the end of the year to avoid putting pressure on supplies heading into 2027.

"We are continuing to monitor the situation very closely - with rain forecast this week, we're hopeful this will help ease some pressure on our water supply," he said.

Water demand has also been high. Jersey Water recorded its largest daily consumption of the year on Sunday 5 July, when islanders used 25.409 million litres.

That figure was close to the highest daily consumption recorded over the past decade: 25.854 million litres on 18 July 2017.

Jersey Water is urging residents to reduce non-essential water use and consider making small changes to their everyday habits.

Mr Bowden said saving water now could help protect supplies, reduce costs and lower the likelihood of restrictions being introduced later this year.

"Every litre we can save now will preserve our critical supply, save money on customers' bills and reduce the likelihood of needing restrictions this year," he said.