Saving Water at Sheepdrove Eco Conference Centre

What's your water footprint? Saving water is increasingly important in a world of increasing resource demand, future climate effects on rainfall and global water pollution. Rainfall is greater in Spain than across England and Wales together, so let's make the most of it!

Saving water also means saving energy - and greenhouse gases too. According to the BRE (Building Research Establishment) it costs approximately 0.44kg CO2 for every 1,000 litres of tapwater.

Waste water gets recycled by our large Reedbed System where a series of habitats purify the water ecologically. When clean, it returns to the chalk aquifer (water table) beneath the organic farmland that surrounds the conference centre.

Rainwater captured by the conference centre roof goes straight into the reedbed system, rather than a soakaway drain. This helps to offset water demands by adding to the volumes of water recycled, while reducing the concentration of nitrates into the settling pond. Cleaner water in the pond helps to increase the variety of aquatic life.

The Reedbed System annually cleans and recycles 10 million litres of water. That equates to a massive saving of 4,400 kilos of CO2 per year from our Carbon Footprint.

What's more, the 'effluent' leaving our Reedbed System has a lower nitrate content than the water supply that we abstract (and have to filter) from deep down in the chalk. That's sustainable water management for you - it's all helping to make the water supply cleaner and safer in future.