Research and analysis

Dry weather and drought in England: 5 September to 11 September 2025

Updated 12 September 2025

Applies to England

1. Summary

This week has been generally wet across England, particularly across the west and north-west. England received 45% of the long-term average rainfall for September in the first 9 days, which is the same amount of rainfall as we received in the whole of August. Despite this, the rain will not reverse months of dry weather. This means we all need to continue to manage demand, maintain supplies and protect the environment.

The National Drought Group is meeting on Monday 15 September. The main focus will be on the environmental impacts of drought this year. The group will also review the current water resources position and actions being taken.

Public water supply reservoir storage has continued to decline across most areas, although at a reduced rate. Stocks across England for the period ending 9 September stood at 56.1%, falling by 1.4% over the last week at a rate less than the previous week. Stocks in the Pennines group and Yorkshire group now stand at 29% and 30.3%, respectively. Six other reservoirs are now below 40% full (Ardingly, Chew Valley, Blagdon, Clatworthy, Derwent Valley and Elan Valley). Fifteen water companies have activated their drought plans, with four companies continuing to implement Temporary Use Bans (TUBs). Two water companies have submitted 42 drought permits in total, with 21 granted by the Environment Agency and the rest in determination – these are mainly for Yorkshire Water. The Environment Agency continues to support Yorkshire Water due to concerns with public water supply and current impacts on the environment from this drought.

The wetter weather over the last two weeks has increased soil moisture and movement. This has led some water companies to report an increase in mains bursts and leaks. It is essential that water companies continue to reduce leakage to conserve water.

The recent rainfall has been welcomed by farmers and growers, but it has not been sufficient to reverse the impacts from drought this year. Pressures remain on the agriculture sector and there are still some issues with harvesting of root vegetable crops. There are still 812 hands off flow restrictions in force on abstraction licences, which will limit the ability to irrigate and lift crops where the ground is dry.

Environmental incidents due to drought or dry weather, including low flows, fish mortalities and algal blooms, have continued to rise across England with 240 recorded in the year to date. Relatively high numbers have been recorded in the North West and West Midlands.

Widespread closures and restrictions remain in place across the Canal & River Trust network. Approximately 400 miles of the network is affected with navigation closures mainly concentrated across northern and central areas of England. Despite the recent rainfall there is no notable recovery in reservoir levels. The overall reservoir position is the worst on record. Some reservoir holdings are critically low.

2. Area drought status

There have been no changes in area drought status this week:

2.1 Areas in drought

• Cumbria & Lancashire (CLA)
• Greater Manchester Merseyside & Cheshire (GMMC)
• Yorkshire (YOR)
• East Midlands (EMD)
• West Midlands (WMD)

2.2 Areas in prolonged dry weather

• North East (NEA)
• Lincolnshire and Northamptonshire (LNA)
• East Anglia (EAN)
• Thames (THM)
• Wessex (WSX)
• Solent and South Downs (SSD)

2.3 How the stages of drought response work

Each area is reviewing its status depending on the triggers they have outlined in their drought plan.

More detail of how we manage drought, including our 4 stages of drought response, is available in Drought: how it is managed in England.

3. Current water situation

This week has seen a continuation of the wet weather, with England receiving 19mm rainfall in the 7 days ending 9 September. It has been wetter in the south-west and north-west, and drier in the east and north-east. In the first 9 days of September, rainfall varied from 31% of the long-term average rainfall for September in the north-east to 68% of long-term monthly average in the south-west.

Soil moisture deficits have reduced slightly across England, more so in those areas that received the higher rainfall totals. However, soil moisture deficits are still close to their maxima across the east, central and north-east parts of the country.

The wet weather has seen river flows rise across most of our indicator sites. Despite the rain, 17 sites (31% of the total) were below normal, with five (9%) notably low. Three indicator sites, all in the north-east, are exceptionally low for the time of year: the Rivers Derwent, Swale and Till. 26 sites (48%) were classed as normal.

Reservoir storage levels for England fell by 1.4% during the past week to 56.1% for the period ending 9 September. Stocks continued to fall in four-fifths of reservoirs but have started to rise slowly in the remaining fifth. Stocks in the Pennines group and Yorkshire group now stand at 29% and 30.3%, respectively. Six other reservoirs are now below 40% full (Ardingly, Chew Valley, Blagdon, Clatworthy, Derwent Valley and Elan Valley).

Groundwater levels continue to recede across England, as we would expect at this time of year. Groundwater levels in the Chilterns, North Downs and across parts of East Anglia are in their normal range for the time of year. Levels in chalk aquifers in Yorkshire, Lincolnshire, Norfolk and parts of the North Downs are below normal or notably low. Levels in the Wessex Downs, Cotswolds, and parts of the South Downs are exceptionally low for the time of year.

More details are available in our water situation reports for England.

4. Public water supply

Most water companies continue to follow their drought plans. However, some water companies are not implementing all the actions they have identified in their plans. Several water companies have seen slight water resource improvements or levelling off due to the recent rainfall, however further significant rainfall is needed to return to normal conditions. Some companies have experienced a reduction in demand for water since last week, although leakage has increased for some companies due to rapid changes in soil moisture deficit creating ground movement.

Water companies report their drought response using operational drought levels, from drought level 1 escalating to level 4.

4.1 Anglian Water

Remains at drought level 1 in the following supply areas:

• Fenland
• Lincolnshire Central
• Norfolk Norwich and the Broads
• Ruthamford Central, North, South, and West
• Essex South

There is no significant change to its water resource position from last week.

4.2 Bristol Water

Remains at drought level 2. Reservoir storage has started to level off this week, and demand has reduced. The company is continuing work to optimise sources and increase water treatment works output to protect reservoir storage.

4.3 Cambridge Water

Remains at drought level 1. There is no significant change to its water resource position from last week.

4.4 Essex and Suffolk Water

Remains at drought level 1 in its Essex and Northern Central supply areas. No significant change to water resource position from last week.

4.5 Northumbrian Water

Remains at drought level 1. The Company are using Kielder and other sources to provide support to some of its smaller reservoirs. We are working with the company to understand and review potential actions that may be required.

4.6 Severn Trent Water

Remains at drought level 1b in its North Staffs and Strategic Grid North supply areas and at drought level 1a in its Central area. Reservoirs are continuing to decline.

4.7 Southern Water

Remains at drought level 2 in its Southampton West and Isle of Wight supply areas and implemented a TUB on 21 July for customers in these areas. Southern Water applied to Defra for a drought order to alter its River Test abstraction licence conditions. This is to allow the company to further abstract water below the sustainable level, where it would otherwise have had to stop to comply with the licence. If granted, this drought order will allow the company to abstract at lower flows in the River Test and this may affect protected species such as salmon. The company also included an application for a non-essential use drought order. The application was submitted on 18 July and following an objection to the drought order, a hearing took place on 28 August. The Planning Inspectorate will provide its report this week and Defra will make a determination within 7 calendar days of the report. Recent rainfall has increased some river flows in the area, including the River Test.

4.8 South East Water

Remains at drought level 2. The company implemented a TUB in its Kent and Sussex supply areas on 18 July. Recent rainfall has helped improve river flows and stabilised reservoir storage, which had been declining steeply over the summer. Storage at Arlington and Ardingly reservoirs remains similar to last week. Demand has reduced since last week. South East Water applied for the Ardingly winter drought permit on 28 August. The company is reviewing further actions that may be required. More detail is available here: Water latest South East Water.

4.9 South Staffordshire Water

Remains at drought level 2. Blithfield reservoir continues to decline but has slowed from last week. Demand has reduced from last week.

4.10 Thames Water

Remains at drought level 2 in its Swindon and Oxfordshire supply area (SWOX) and drought level 1 in its London zone. Thames Water implemented a TUB for its SWOX customers on 22 July.

4.11 United Utilities

Remains at drought level 1 in its Strategic Grid supply area. Recent rainfall has improved storage in the Carlisle resource zone, which is now in its enhanced monitoring and operation level. The company’s Pennine reservoirs continue to decline and remain of concern.

4.12 Veolia Water

Remains at drought level 1. No significant changes. The water resource position has slightly improved from last week and demand remains stable.

4.13 Wessex Water

Remains at drought level 1b. The water resource position has slightly improved from last week and demand has reduced.

4.14 Yorkshire Water

Has moved into drought level 3 and reservoirs continue to decline. Demand has reduced since last week. The expectation is that once drought permits are implemented, this should slow the rate of decline. The company implemented a TUB on 11 July. The two Wharfe drought permits and the Ouse drought order were granted on 22 August. The north-west group (12 drought permits) have been granted (10 on 5 September and 2 on the 10 September). The south group (7 drought permits) have been granted (5 September). Yorkshire water applied for its south-west group (20 drought permits) on 4 September. More detail is available on Yorkshire Water’s website. 

5. Agriculture

The recent rainfall has been welcomed by farmers and growers, but it has not been sufficient to reverse the impacts from drought this year. Pressures remain on the agriculture sector. Even though the bulk of the harvest has been completed, there are still some issues with harvesting of root vegetable crops, such as potatoes, due to dry soil conditions. Despite the rain, there are still 812 hands off flow restrictions in force on abstraction licences, which will limit the ability to irrigate and lift crops where the ground is dry.

The 2025 harvest season has been variable and started earlier than usual (in July) due to the long dry spell. This year’s harvest has seen generally lower and poorer quality of crop yields, particularly with vegetable crops. Livestock farmers are facing a growing risk with forage becoming increasingly expensive due to poor grass growth and significantly reduced volumes and quality of hay and straw. This means farmers are using winter feed and forage earlier than planned in the year and are needing to buy additional food or sell animals to reduce pressure on winter feed supplies. Dry weather emergency grants were recently launched by the Addington Fund to help the most in need livestock farmers struggling with forage and feed supplies ahead of this winter. Temporary derogations for agri-environmental schemes are being requested for situations where schemes that hold forage could be cut or grazed early.

Growers are now making decisions about next year’s crops and are concerned about water availability for next year, especially if there is a dry autumn and winter. This will affect farmers ability to replenish farm irrigation reservoirs, especially if river flows remain low.

The need for Section 57 spray irrigation bans in parts of East Anglia and West Midlands is reducing due to the recent rainfall and lower demands from irrigators. We have previously written to licence holders in these areas requesting voluntary reductions on surface water abstraction. There are currently 521 voluntary abstraction restriction requests across the country.

We continue to engage and support the agriculture sector and in total we have received 29 flexible abstraction requests, including 16 requests in our Yorkshire Area. These help abstractors manage with the exceptionally dry weather. Following the recent round of local resource options, we are reviewing applications to help farmers and growers improve long term water resilience.

We continue to proactively update our dry weather communications for the agriculture sector, through the Environment Agency dry weather farming blog and Water Hub webpage, to highlight support available to farmers to help improve access to water.  

6. Energy

There are no known issues with the energy sector.

7. Environment

Environmental incidents due to drought or dry weather have continued to rise across England, with 240 recorded in the year to date. Relatively high concentrations have been recorded in the North West, across the West Midlands and close to the south coast.

Numbers of confirmed (category 1 to 3) abstraction or low flow incidents remain similar to corresponding counts from 2018 and 2020 but remain well below 2022 figures. Numbers of estimated and confirmed (category 1 to 3) abstraction or low flow incidents continue to accumulate, with most reports over the past week coming from Yorkshire.

Low river flows have led to distress for fish in some areas. Environment Agency Fisheries teams continue with fish rescues and are monitoring sites regularly. Numbers of confirmed (category 1 to 3) incidents with dead fish remain below corresponding counts from previous years and the proportion of these due to drought or dry weather remains low (17%). A similarly low proportion of all this year’s algae incidents (13%), which have predominantly been recorded across London and the South East, have been attributed to drought and dry weather.

Severn Regulation: There have been 85 days of Severn Regulation so far this year and 9 September was the first non-regulation day after a 62-day continuous period.

The Environment Agency has applied for five drought orders to protect the environment:

• one for Elslack reservoir (submitted on 26 June)
• one for Winterburn reservoir (submitted on 7 August)
• 2 for Holme Styes reservoir (granted 28 July and 3 September)
• one for Belmont reservoir (submitted on 15 August)

8. Navigation

Widespread closures and restrictions remain in place across the Canal & River Trust network due to the dry weather. The Canal & River Trust is experiencing a worse situation than the 2022 drought, with approximately 20% of the network closed (compared to 15% in 2022). Approximately 400 miles of the network are affected, with navigation closures being mainly, but not exclusively, concentrated across northern and central areas of England.

Despite the recent rainfall, there hasn’t been any notable recovery in reservoir levels. The overall reservoir position is the worst on record with some reservoir holdings critically low. The Trust is regularly reviewing the situation and will reopen canals wherever possible - as soon as the water resources situation improves.

The latest closures and restrictions are listed on the Canal & River Trust website. The Canal & River Trust are still planning for contingency and emergency situations for several canals. The Trust have brought forward some winter engineering works whilst parts of the network are closed.

The Environment Agency, as the navigational authority for the River Thames, has been managing low flows through the Oxford watercourses. With the recent rainfall and rise in river levels, there has been a reduction of navigation issues.

9. Weather forecast

Friday 12 September is likely to be much brighter for many eastern areas of England, however isolated showers, potentially heavy, are forecast for western areas. On Saturday conditions remain changeable with sunny spells and blustery showers for most areas. More persistent rain across England is likely on Sunday with the unsettled theme continuing on Monday and Tuesday with further showers and brighter spells.

10. Drought readiness actions

In response to the drought and dry weather, the Environment Agency continues to act by: 

• operating our Gold command structure for our national incident response
• coordinating closely with water companies to implement statutory drought plans, taking necessary action to safeguard public water supplies
• activating drought plans for those Environment Agency Areas in drought and PDW status
• enhancing abstraction licence compliance checks and issuing hands off flow or level restrictions and warnings to some abstractors in areas experiencing low flows
• monitoring, preparing and responding to incidents caused by low river flows, particularly in those Environment Agency Areas in drought status
• preparing dry weather advice to fishery operators to help protect their waters
• hosting regular national drought meetings

The next National Drought Group meeting is scheduled for 15 September.

11. Contact us

Contact drought.national@environment-agency.gov.uk if you have questions about this report.