Full Description

In February 2003 the Deputy Prime Minister, John Prescott, launched his action plan for SustainableCommunities. 22 billion was made available "to tackle deprivation and shortage of affordablehousing by delivering sustainable communities for all". During the past two decades there has been ashift from public-sector renting to owner-occupation. With the annual rate of new house building indecline, less than 140,000 houses annually, there has been a tendency to build large houses on lowdensity developments aimed at the middle and upper-end of the market. The plan, in recognition ofthe growing demand for more affordable housing has allocated 5 billion to support the building ofsuch developments.A key part of the plan is the provision for major growth in the following four areas: Thames Gateway,Milton Keynes/South Midlands, Ashford and London-Stansted-Cambridge. All of these areas are inthe southeast of England, where the population density is the highest in the country and the wateravailability is the lowest. Although the definition of a sustainable community includes "buildings thatminimize the use of resources", the environmental consequences of the water used by these additionalone million homes were not a major factor in the government's thinking. In 2001 the EnvironmentAgency published its national water resources strategy with a map of England and Wales indicatingmany river catchments in the south-east of England already experiencing over-abstraction.As water resources are not a material consideration in land-use planning issues, lack of water cannotbe used as a reason to limit development: the thinking is that the water can always be brought in fromsomewhere. Hence the challenge then becomes to make these new homes as water efficient aspossible.The paper outlines the government proposal and sets it in the context of available water resources.The Environment Agency has considered a number of policy options to try to ensure that theenvironmental impact of these new homes on the water environment is limited. These policy optionsare detailed and for each an assessment is made of what the impact on the water used in the homewould be by comparing it to the predicted water use in a standard dwelling. Includes 14 references, tables, figures.

Product Details

Edition: Vol. - No. Published: 01/11/2004 Number of Pages: 10File Size: 1 file , 370 KB