England could face drought conditions this summer after the driest start to spring in almost 70 years, the Environment Agency has said.
Reservoirs in the country are dropping, and farmers are struggling to grow crops after the sunniest April on record, preceded by less than half the average rainfall in March.
A “medium” risk of summer drought has been declared, and while there are currently no hosepipe bans planned, this is one of the agency’s possible courses of action.
After a meeting on Wednesday of the government’s National Drought Group – which includes the Met Office, government, regulators, water companies, farmers and conservation experts – the environmental regulator urged firms to do more to safeguard supplies.
“If the prolonged dry weather continues, water companies may need to implement their dry weather plans in the weeks and months ahead”, the agency said in a statement.
Deputy Director of Water, Richard Thompson, said more frequent droughts were down to climate change and said more are likely in the coming decades.
He said “it’s heartening to see more people looking to reduce their water use and we expect water companies to do more to cut leakage and rollout smart meters”.
The warning to suppliers comes after England’s driest start to spring in March and April since 1956.
April was the sunniest on record, as just 56% of the expected rainfall was recorded across the UK as a whole, and just half the average rainfall for England, Met Office figures showed.
That followed less than half (43%) of the average rainfall across the UK in March, with England getting a quarter of the rain it would normally expect for the month.
Sky News weather producer Chris England said drought concerns were down to the fact it had been “very warm overall”, which he put down to “a meandering jet stream, which can cause either high or low temperatures and rainfall, depending on where the meanders are”.
He said that it’s “what is expected from a warming Arctic”.
“This year, high pressure has often been located over or near the UK, blocking the passage of the fronts we normally get,” he added.
Reservoirs in England are 84% full, even less than in the drought year of 2022, when levels were at 90%.
Levels in northeast and northwest England, are either notably low or exceptionally low.
Farmers have had to start irrigating crops early, with more pressure on their onsite storage reservoirs.
River flows across northern and central England are below normal or lower for this time of year and wildfires have been seen in areas including Cumbria, Derbyshire and Dorset due to dry vegetation, the agency said.
The weather has flipped between extremes in the past few years, with drought and record-breaking heatwaves in 2022, followed by record wet conditions, and now a return to low rainfall.
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National Farmers’ Union (NFU) vice president Rachel Hallos said “farmers in some parts of the country have started to irrigate crops much earlier than normal” and warned recent extreme weather patterns are “impacting our ability to feed the nation”.
