A sustainable water cycle Our role is to abstract the water people need, when they need it, and from the right places, in sustainable quantities. And after households and businesses have used it, we clean it and return it to our rivers, maintaining a sustainable water cycle. To ensure we’re fit for the future, we’re building capacity and resilience into our systems, looking to achieve the following: Reduce the amount of water used. By focusing on water efficiency and reducing leaks, we conserve precious water resources, ensure we protect river ecosystems and biodiversity, and reduce the volume of water we need to treat and pump across our network. Take less water from the environment. We manage our abstraction (pumping water from rivers and aquifers) to ensure it is sustainable. We are reducing abstraction where it is having an adverse impact, and working to make better use of our most sustainable sources. Make sure we return only clean water to our rivers. We measure the quality of treated water effluent, but face a key challenge in the form of pollutions. These are mostly a result of sewage escaping before it is properly treated. Enhancing our natural environment Without nature, we couldn’t take care of one of life’s essentials. A flourishing environment plays an important role in the health of our business – a vital partner to our reservoirs, treatment works and underground pipeline network. When we look after nature, we look after water. Our priorities for enhancing the natural environment include the following: Nature recovery on our own land. Our estate is the natural place for us to start, and at the heart of our contribution to nature recovery. We work to understand the land we have, care for designated sites, and integrate our biodiversity aims in our land-management activities. Boosting nature beyond our boundaries. We’re embarking on one of the biggest nature projects in the UK in The Great Big Nature Boost. And because no one organisation can solve all that needs solving, we are working closely with NGO partnerships. Making nature part of catchment management. For every £1 we spend on reducing agricultural run-off, we think we can avoid between £2 and £20 of treatment costs and generate £4 of wider environmental benefits. Our Farming for Water programme works directly with farmers on this and on-farm biodiversity. Making the most of our resources There’s a whole new world out there if we can just think about waste as a valuable resource in the wrong place, rather than something to throw away. Adopting a circular economy approach in all areas of our business means engineering for efficiency, designing out wastage, and fostering the skills and knowledge we need to succeed in this. If we can use fewer resources and reduce the impact of their extraction on nature and biodiversity, we can save money, reduce waste and lower our greenhouse gas emissions. Where others see waste, we see opportunity. Our priorities for making our resources circular include: Turning waste into resources. We’re a leader in converting sewage to energy and we apply this expertise to food waste too. We’re also extracting valuable resources from waste and creating new products. Making our material use circular. By applying circular economy principles, we can use less, source responsibly, repair and extend product life where possible, and then recover and regenerate. Mitigating climate change We are at a key point in the fight against climate change, and what we all do over the next ten years will be critical in trying to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees. Which is why, in 2019, we announced our Triple Carbon Pledge of: net-zero operational carbon emissions, 100% renewable energy and 100% electric vehicles by 2030 (where available). Our work builds on the collaborative industry-wide 2030 route map to net-zero, published through Water UK in November 2020, which provides a framework for the entire sector to strive for ambitious decarbonisation goals. Here’s how we plan to do our bit: Cutting our direct emissions. These emissions come from our vehicle fleet, our on-site fossil fuel use and, most significantly, the waste-water treatment process. Improving our energy efficiency and boosting renewable energy supply. Reducing Scope 3 emissions. Understanding our supply chain and the materials we use in more detail to work together to reduce the size of our carbon impact. Linked SDGs Taking care of the environment Ensuring a sustainable water cycle Secure water sources in the long-term – through catchment management, demand reduction and climate change adaptation – so that we can deliver our services for future generations. Enhancing our natural environment Protect and enhance nature at each stage of the water cycle by improving biodiversity and stopping pollution, benefiting nature, local communities and our business. Making the most of our resources Generate renewable energy and other useful resources from our waste, and aim for zero waste to landfill through our business activities. Mitigating climate change Play our part in reducing global carbon emissions in line with the Paris Agreement, aiming for net zero carbon and supporting the UK’s energy transition. Looking after the world around us Our priorities