Water statistics

Jersey Water annual statistics

Jersey Water supplies water to approximately 38,000 homes and businesses from two water treatment works. In 2021, Jersey Water supplied 7.1 billion litres through a 580 km network of water mains.

See the water abstraction section for details on water not supplied through the mains network.

Annual mains water supplied in Jersey (millions of litres)

Source: Jersey Water, download the chart data

Maximum daily water demand in Jersey (millions of litres)

Source: Jersey Water, download the chart data

Jersey’s water resources are nearly all derived from rainfall dependent surface waters.

Jersey Water collects and stores raw (untreated) water in six storage reservoirs with a capacity of 2,678 million litres, which is equivalent to approximately 120 days of average demand. In addition, the La Rosière desalination plant can produce 10.8 million litres per day, approximately half the Island's average daily water usage.

Annual rainfall in Jersey (millimetres)

Source: Jersey Met, download the chart data

Water connections and mains laid/re-laid from 2012 to 2021

 Jersey Water monthly statistics

Monthly water consumption has been between 500 and 750 million litres per month since 2010, with higher usage during the summer months. 

Monthly water consumption in Jersey (millions of litres)

Source: Jersey Water, download the chart data

Rainfall is more variable than water consumption, with average rainfall in June-August typically being around half that of October-December. Some years differ considerably from the average. For example, the high rainfalls in both October and November 2019 were almost double their 30-year averages for 1981-2020, while the low rainfall in August 2021 was less than half of its 30-year average for the same period.

Monthly rainfall in Jersey (millimetres)

Source: Jersey Met, download the chart data

Further information on Jersey's climate and long-term weather averages are available on the following page.

Climate statistics

Further information regarding Jersey Water is available from their website.

Jersey Water website 

Bathing water quality

You can find the latest sea water quality results by following the link below.

Sea water monitoring

Water pollution incidents

Water pollution incidents are reported to Environmental Protection through the pollution hotline. 

In 2022:

• 68 water pollution incidents were reported
• the number of reported incidents decreased by 30% compared to 2021
  
• reported incidents were 35% below the recent long-term average (2006 to 2021)

Environmental Protection are continuing to try and reduce the number of incidents through its pollution prevention campaigns and public engagement.

Total number of reported pollution incidents

Source: States of Jersey Department of the Environment, download chart data

In 2017, oil incidents were the most frequently reported water pollution incidents (39%). 

Unsubstantiated incidents are incidents that either did not involve water pollution or did not present a risk of pollution. However, they are included in the data as Environmental Protection’s resources were used.

Reported water pollution incidents by type

Source: States of Jersey Department of the Environment, download chart data

Enforcement action is taken in accordance with Environmental Protection’s enforcement policy. 

For 44% of reported incidents no formal enforcement action can be taken because there is no contravention of the Water Pollution Law, evidence of pollution or an offender cannot be identified. 

Water pollution hotline

Water abstractions

Water abstraction licenses and registrations

The Water Resources (Jersey) Law 2007 came into force on 1 January 2010. 

The law requires that all water abstractions that exceed 15 cubic metres in any 24 hour period must be licensed. This includes:

• abstractions from surface sources (streams, reservoirs etc.)
• abstractions from sub-surface (groundwater) sources such as wells and boreholes

All abstractions for domestic purposes (irrespective of quantity) are exempt from licensing but must be registered.

Abstractions from sub-surface sources for non-domestic purposes that are less than the above quantity must be registered.

Private water abstractions

An estimated 515,700 cubic metres (about 113.4 million gallons) of water is abstracted for domestic household requirements from private sources.

Around 9% of the population get their household water supply from private sources (boreholes, wells and springs).

The majority of registered water abstractions provide a domestic supply to a single property.

Number of households and people supplied by registered or licensed private water supplies (boreholes, wells and surface water) for drinking water in April 2019

Private water supplies: registration and licenses​