East Cambridgeshire District Council Water Cycle Study Detailed ...

Stage 2 Water Cycle Study: Final Report
Sept 2011
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Cambridgeshire Horizons
East Cambridgeshire – Detailed WCS
The following sets out the key objectives of the Detailed WCS for East Cambridgeshire:
• determine the required solutions to wastewater treatment for each growth town and how this
might impact phasing of development within (and around) each town;
• determine whether any Habitats Directive designated ecological sites have he potential to be
impacted by the wastewater treatment strategy via a screening process;
• determine whether additional water resources are required to support growth;
• determine upgrades required to water supply infrastructure relative to potential options for
growth;
• provide a pathway to achievement of water neutrality;
• provide detail on location specific SuDS requirements and policy recommendations to
achieve sustainable drainage;
• provide infrastructure phasing timelines for each growth town to determine impact of
infrastructure and mitigation provision on housing delivery;
• undertake a sensitivity analysis of the impacts of climate change on infrastructure provision.
• provide developer guidance at site level; and
• provide detailed policy recommendations.
1.5 Study Visions and Drivers
For each Water cycle ‘topic’, this Stage 2 study report lists the specific visions and drivers
relevant to that topic within the relevant report section and sets out how these specific visions
and drivers have shaped the assessment of capacity and solutions required to facilitate
sustainable growth. There are however, several key overarching study visions and drivers that
are described subsequently given their importance in shaping the direction of the study as a
whole:
• Deliver sustainable water management - the overall vision that underpins the WCS is the
requirement to ensure that provision of WSI and mitigation is sustainable and contributes to
the overall delivery of sustainable growth and development as set out in the Cambridgeshire
Quality Charter for Growth;
• aspire to achieve water neutrality – determine what is required in order to get as close as
possible to ensuring that water demand in East Cambridgeshire at the end of the plan period,
is no greater than it is now; and
• Water Framework Directive compliance – to ensure that growth, through abstraction of
water for supply and discharge of treated wastewater, does not prevent waterbodies in East
Cambridgeshire (and more widely) from achieving the standards required of them as set out
in the Water Framework Directive (WFD) Anglian River Basin Management Plan
A full list of the key legislative drivers shaping the study is detailed in the Joint Outline WCS,
and a summary table is included in Appendix 1 for reference.
The joint East Cambridgeshire and Fenland WCS Outline report 2 defined other relevant studies
that have a bearing on the provision of water services infrastructure for development. This list
includes (but is not limited to the following key documents:
• Level 1 Strategic Flood Risk Assessment for East Cambridgeshire;