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What Is Water Bankruptcy And How Can You Prevent It?

The concept of bankruptcy is usually something that would happen to your business if your finances went badly wrong or you suffered a huge loss of customers in a recession. It is not normally something you would associate with water.

However, that is now changing as a new term – water bankruptcy – has entered the lexicon. It is something everyone will need to be aware of, even in the relatively wet UK.

The term comes from a new UN report on climate change and its effects, which states that the majority of countries are now living beyond their water means, and are in effect in a “water overdraught”. This implies that drought is not a singular event, but a permanent state.

Faced with such problems, innovative solutions may be required by businesses around the globe, such as accessing an off-grid water supply like a well when the reservoirs run dry.

To do that means working with expert companies like ourselves, that can help with water saving, recycling and the establishment of solutions to acquire new water sources.

How Is Water Bankruptcy Manifesting Itself?

Among the notable features of this depletion of available water supplies is:

•       Shrunken lakes and reduced river water flows, with half of the major lakes around the world losing water since the 1990s
•       The depletion of groundwater resources and, with it, increased ground salination
•       The shrinkage of glaciers, down by 30 per cent of mass since the 1970s
•       Around four billion people already live with severe water scarcity for at least one month per year
•       Several cities have been close to ‘day zero’ situations when the water has almost run out, examples including Cape Town, Tehran and Chennai
•       On current projections for rising global temperatures and population growth, these problems will only get worse in the coming years

These shortages inevitably affect some places more than others. Anthropocentric global warming is certainly not the only cause of lake water loss, for example. In some instances, water diversion for agricultural purposes is the chief cause, such as the Aral Sea disaster.

Is The UK At Risk Of Water Bankruptcy?

According to the report, the regions most affected are in the tropics, with Africa and Asia containing the most areas facing extreme shortages. This may be related to factors such as glacier depletion in the Himalayas and high population levels.

This is highlighted by the map on page 33, which shows how badly such areas are affected. This may raise a few questions over the UK, where half of the country, essentially the more southern and eastern part, is listed as facing a ‘low to medium’ risk and the rest ‘low’.

Compared with the majority of the planet, this may seem very mild and no great worry. But the reality is that the UK – and your firm – is facing potential future water shortages that need addressing.

Why Should You Act To Make Your Own Firm More Water Resilient?

In some regards, the UK is in a favourable position. There is no reliance on glaciers in a country with none (Scotland may have last had some in the ‘mini ice age’ around 1700). Wetter winters are expected to be the norm in a warmer world, filling the reservoirs.

However, companies do have serious reasons to take action:

•       Those who are multinationals may face trouble at their sites in ‘water-bankrupt’ areas
•       Companies importing goods may find that water bankruptcy negatively impacts their supply chains
•       Even if the UK will not be affected as badly as most countries, there will still be growing areas of ‘water stress’, with the Environment Agency warning of severe shortages by 2040 and most regions expected to face problems by 2030.

The idea of Britain facing water bankruptcy after winters like the one it has just endured – the eighth wettest on record in England – may seem fanciful to some, but a combination of hotter and drier summers, a larger population and growing business needs will squeeze demand.

How Should Your Company Respond To Water Stress?

Your business should not sit back and wait for others to fix the problem, but discover what you can do to increase your own resilience in the face of a growing water supply threat.

True, the government is now working on nine new reservoirs, a significant change from no new ones being completed since 1992, but much more will need to be done. There is no room for complacency or leaving it to others to solve the problem.

Solutions we can help with to protect your company’s water supply include:

•       Wells
•       Water saving measures
•       Green roofing
•       Recycling

Off-grid solutions may provide your firm with the water security it needs, providing a buttress against drought and ensuring that, in the UK at least, companies using a lot of water do not face a ‘water overdraught’, let alone bankruptcy.