The British Geological Survey is warning that groundwater is a cause for concern, playing as it does an important role in water supply in the UK, both for agriculture and irrigation and for public supply.

During the summer of 2022 concern has focused on heatwaves and the lack of rainfall. These factors combine to cause low flows in rivers, low stocks in reservoirs and increased demand for water, but one area of the drought that has received less attention is groundwater.

Since groundwater is out of sight below the ground it receives less attention than rivers, lakes and reservoirs. However, there is another reason for the current lack of attention; at the time of writing, groundwater in the UK has not yet been affected by the drought to the same extent as surface water and it’s helping bridge the supply gap left by the lack of rainfall that is affecting surface-water reservoirs.

Survey models predict that levels in the groundwater supply (aquifers) will remain low to notably low in a few places for the next one-to-three months, but it is harder to predict how quickly groundwater levels in aquifers will recover beyond October 2022. If hotter, drier summers do become more common, groundwater’s role as a safe storage reservoir to capture winter rainfall may become even more important in the future.

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