Britons risk fines for nonessential use of water

WASHINGTON POST
LONDON -- Starting this week, hundreds of thousands of people in homes and businesses across southeastern England risk criminal prosecution and fines of about $9,000 or more for any nonessential use of water, including filling private swimming pools or watering playing fields, parks or golf courses. More than 13 million people in London and southeastern England are already under a residential ban on using hoses or sprinklers to wash cars or water lawns; violators face fines of up to about $1,800.
British officials have declared this country's first drought emergency in 11 years, and they warn that an epic water shortage looms in parts of the country, perhaps including London.
"If we get a hot, dry summer, then it could possibly be the worst drought in the past hundred years," said Lisa Beechey of the Environment Agency. She said there is a "small but real risk" that officials will have to shut off water to homes in parts of southeastern England this summer, forcing people to collect drinking water in buckets from emergency spigots set up in their neighborhoods. This last happened in 1976.
The problem is so acute that water company officials have publicly discussed the possibility of shipping in fresh water from Scandinavia in converted oil tankers -- and even towing an iceberg to England. Officials at Thames Water, which supplies London, have also proposed addressing the problem for the long term by building a desalinization plant to transform the Thames' murky contents into drinking water, but city officials oppose the idea.