The Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs has updated the delivery plan for the water demand targets first published in December 2025. The Environment Act 2021 set out a series of legally binding statutory targets to improve the natural environment and leave it in a better state for future generations.
To ensure progress, the Environment Act requires that each statutory target has at least one interim target set in the Environmental Improvement Plan (EIP) which covers the 5 years from publication of the latest revision of the EIP.
The water demand delivery plan published in December 2025 outlined the delivery plan for statutory and interim Environment Act targets relating to water demand.
The Statutory Environment Act target is to reduce the use of public water supply in England per head of population by 20% by 2038 from a 2019 to 2020 baseline.
The interim targets are as follows:
Public water supply
Reduce the use of public water supply in England per head of population by 9% by 31 March 2027 and by 14% by 31 March 2032 from a 2019 to 2020 baseline.
Leakage
Reduce leakage by 20% by 31 March 2027 and by 30% by 31 March 2032 from a 2017 to 2018 baseline.
The plan has now been updated to reflect current delivery information, including policy delivery measures, information on evidence of impact and milestones. This includes new information on water company leakage commitments, smart meter rollout, the Water White Paper and water efficiency measures.
Key milestones for 2025 included:
- water companies begin or continue rolling out approximately 10.4 million smart meters (2025 to 2030)
- Ofwat’s Smart Water Metering Delivery Group launched to consider Baringa report recommendations
- consultation on building regulations goes out and government response published
Key milestones for 2026 include:
- secondary legislation laid for the mandatory water efficiency labelling scheme (MWELS) which is currently in development
- Government response for the Building Regulations is published
- consultation on water recycling and drainage standards (2026 to 2027)
- legislation and policy work to enable the government Water White Paper measures has started. This will work to enable reuse through planning, and support customer access to smart meters.
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