a Category includes public and private water supplies.
b Category includes fish farming, cress growing and amenity ponds. Excludes spray irrigation.
c Category includes electricity supply and other industries.
The Water Resources Act 1963 led to the formation of 27 catchment‐based authorities responsible for pollution prevention, fisheries, land drainage and water resources. The Act ushered in a decade of groundwater resources management that required the licensing of all abstractions in England and Wales. Under Section 14 of the Act, each authority was required to undertake a survey of resources and the Water Resources Board (abolished 1974) was established with the task of resource planning on a national scale. Regional groundwater schemes were developed in the context of river basin analysis for the purposes of river augmentation by groundwater, seasonal abstraction and artificial recharge. Scientific advancement in the application of numerical models to solve non‐linear equations of groundwater flow permitted the prediction of future groundwater abstraction regimes.
The Water Act 1973 reflected the importance of water quality aspects and heralded the developing interest in groundwater quality. The Act led to the formation of 10 catchment‐based regional water authorities with responsibility for all water and sewerage services and for all parts of the water cycle. The Control of Pollution Act 1974 extended the powers of the regional water authorities in controlling effluent discharge to underground strata and limited certain activities that could lead to polluting discharges. The first aquifer protection policies were developed at this time.
The Water Act 1989 separated the water supply and regulatory functions of the regional water authorities, and the new National Rivers Authority was set‐up to manage water resources planning, abstraction control, pollution prevention and aquifer protection. A number of other Acts of Parliament followed including the Environmental Protection Act 1990 and the Water Resources Act 1991 that control the direct and indirect discharge of harmful substances into groundwater and are, in part, an enactment of the European Communities Directive on the Protection of Groundwater Against Certain Dangerous Substances (80/68/EEC). Further controls on discharges were implemented under the Groundwater Regulations 1998. In addition, the Water Resources Act 1991 consolidated all the provisions of the Water Resources Act 1963 in respect of the control of groundwater abstractions. In pursuing a strategy to protect both individual borehole sources and wider groundwater resources, the National Rivers Authority (1992) developed its practice and policy for the protection of groundwater with the aim of raising awareness of the vulnerability of groundwater to surface‐derived pollution. Following the establishment of the Environment Agency under the Environment Act 1995 (when the National Rivers Authority, Her Majesty's Inspectorate of Pollution and the Waste Regulatory Authorities were brought together) the practice and policy document for the protection of groundwater was updated (Environment Agency 1998).
Currently, the Environment Agency for England and Wales promotes a national framework for water resources protection in the context of existing European initiatives, principally the Water Framework Directive (Section 1.7.2.1). The Water Act 2003 is one example of legislation to further the sustainable use of water resources and protect the environment. The Act links water abstraction licensing to local water resource availability and moves from a licensing system based on purpose of use to one based on volume consumed. The Act also introduces time‐limited licences to give flexibility in making changes to abstraction rights in the face of climate change and increased demand. From 2012, licences without a time limit will be revoked, without a right to compensation, if an abstraction causes significant environmental damage.
1.7.2 Groundwater abstraction in Europe
In Europe, groundwater is again a significant economic resource. According to a report commissioned for the European Commission (RIVM and RIZA 1991), about 75% of the inhabitants of Europe depend on groundwater for their water supply. As Table 1.6 reveals, large quantities of groundwater are abstracted in Italy (10.40 km3 a−1), as well as Portugal, Germany, Spain and France (all in excess of 5.00 km3 a−1). Groundwater accounts for in excess of 97% of total freshwater abstraction in Malta, Montenegro, Denmark, Croatia and Iceland to less than 10% in Belgium, Bulgaria, Ukraine, The Netherlands, Romania, Hungary and Lithuania. Mediterranean countries rely heavily on groundwater for agricultural irrigation, and of the 29 countries with reported values in Table 1.6, 14 use over half of groundwater abstraction for domestic use.
Table 1.6 Estimated abstraction in European countries (Margat and van der Gun 2013).
(Source: Adapted from Margat, J. and van der Gun, J. (2013) Groundwater Around the World: A Geographic Synopsis. CRC Press/Balkema, EH Leiden.)
| Country | Estimated groundwater abstraction (km3 a−1) | Groundwater abstraction by sector | Groundwater share of total freshwater abstraction (%) | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Irrigation (%) | Domestic use (%) | Industry (%) | |||
| Albania | 0.90 | 61 | 33 | 6 | 53 |
| Andorra | 0.01 | — | — | — | — |
| Austria | 1.12 | 5 | 52 | 43 | 30 |
| Belgium | 0.65 | 4 | 55 |
