The Environment Agency cut Southern Water's Hardham licence on 9 October, seven months late, to 27 megalitres a day. The last step after water neutrality.

Updated 27 October: Horsham District Council has now rewritten its water neutrality page. Headed “Water Neutrality Requirements Withdrawn”, it says that following the Environment Agency’s licence of 9 October “the matter of water neutrality has been resolved and it is no longer necessary for planning assessment to consider this” (Horsham District Council, water neutrality). The Appropriate Assessment step described below has gone with it.

The cut to Southern Water’s licence to pump water at Hardham took effect on Friday 9 October. Hardham is one of the Arun Valley sources that supply the whole district. It was the last unfinished piece of the deal that ended water neutrality, the rule that held up house building across the district for four years.

The Environment Agency issued the varied licence that day. The document is signed by its permitting team and shows a date of issue and an effective date of 9 October 2026 (Environment Agency licence 10/41/431002, published by Horsham District Council). The licence was first issued in January 1966 and now runs to 31 March 2035.

It arrives seven months behind schedule. Natural England’s withdrawal statement of 31 October 2025 said the licence change and the habitat work would be in place by March 2026 (Natural England withdrawal statement).

Hardham is near Pulborough, about 12 miles south-west of Horsham. It draws on the same groundwater that feeds the Arun Valley wetlands at Pulborough Brooks and Amberley Wild Brooks.

What the new licence allows

Southern Water may now pump less from its Hardham boreholes:

  • a daily peak of 27 megalitres, down from 30
  • 4,745 megalitres a year, an average of 13 megalitres a day, down from 6,000 megalitres, or 16.44 a day
  • no more than 600 megalitres in any 30 days
  • no pumping at all when the River Rother at Hardham falls below 63.6 megalitres a day

The licence also obliges the company to keep monitoring water levels and water quality in the wetlands, including at Pulborough Brooks and Amberley Wild Brooks. The old limits are from the council’s Water Supply and Water Quality Topic Paper; the new ones are from the licence itself.

Bar chart of Southern Water's Hardham abstraction caps: the daily peak falls from 30 to 27 megalitres a day, and the annual cap, expressed as a daily average, falls from 16.44 to 13 megalitres a day, under the licence issued on 9 October 2026
Chart by Horsham Daily.
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How we know

The licence was published on Monday 12 October as an appendix to the topic paper. The Local Plan Inspector, Jonathon Bore, had asked the council for that paper before the hearings that opened today (examination news page).

The paper sets out the last few days in order:

Date What happened
6 October Southern Water confirmed its application to vary the licence was with the Environment Agency
6 October The Environment Agency said it had reached the final stages before issuing
9 October The Environment Agency said the change was complete and sent for issue

The paper says Southern Water was already keeping to the lower caps voluntarily before the licence changed. It also says the Environment Agency, Natural England and Southern Water have all reviewed and agreed its contents.

Why it took four years

In September 2021 Natural England told councils in the Sussex North water supply zone that pumping at Hardham might be harming the Arun Valley’s protected sites. New building could not add to it. The zone covers all of Horsham district and most of Crawley.

From then on, nearly every new home had to prove it would be “water neutral”, using no extra mains water overall. The councils spent years building an offsetting scheme that sold water credits. The topic paper says it was “weeks away from its official launch” when Natural England withdrew its position in October 2025. It acted on a study commissioned by Southern Water, whose final version was published in November 2025. The study recommended the lower caps now in force.

Our earlier story on Billingshurst’s Elmfield Green shows what that meant on the ground: a permission granted on appeal in 2023, still varying its water conditions in 2026.

What still applies

The licence change does not lift every condition.

  • New homes must still be water efficient. Every new home is required by condition to meet 110 litres per person per day, because the area is still classed as being under significant water stress (Horsham District Council: water neutrality).
  • The council’s caution has now ended. When this story was first published, its water neutrality page still said officers would carry out an Appropriate Assessment on applications “until the licence change has taken effect”. The page now says water neutrality no longer needs to be considered at all (see the update above).
  • The habitat work is not finished. The RSPB is to manage sluices, desilt ditches and remove invasive species at the Brooks, funded by Southern Water. The topic paper says some measures, such as the sluices, are in place and the rest will follow “over time”.
  • Supply has headroom. Southern Water’s water efficiency savings created a surplus of 3,240,000 litres a day as of 1 November 2025. The council says it is checking every new permission across the zone against it, and that there is “ample headroom”.

What it means for you

If you are waiting on a planning decision, the last formal reason for officers to treat water as an open question has gone, and the council now says planning assessments no longer need to consider it. If you hold an older permission with water neutrality conditions, the council has said it will consider applications to remove them; our guide to Horsham planning applications explains how to search and comment.

If you are following the Local Plan, this is the answer to one of the Inspector’s questions. The topic paper concludes the plan no longer needs a water neutrality policy. The hearings run at Albery House until 22 October, when the Inspector is due to make his announcements (our hearings guide).

If you pay a Southern Water bill, nothing changes. The company has told the council it has no concerns about supplying the homes in the plan.

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