Open the tap and drink a glass of water. Open the tap and wash yourself. Flush the toilet. Turn on the dishwasher, the washing machine, the garden sprinkler. Since almost all households have been connected to the water supply since the early 1960s, the Netherlands knows no better than that there is running – and clean – water.
Why not? Plenty of water, right, except for some dry summers? Electricity seemed to be the problem of the twenty-first century, gas that of recent years. Those who shower economically usually do so to save energy. In the minds of most residents of this country, water is something that must either be kept out by dikes, or something that simply comes out of the tap at home.
The five-to-twelve warnings that clean water must be valued and is finite, which have followed each other in rapid succession in recent years, therefore seemed to disappear into the deep. Or only intended for dry summers, when a spraying ban was imposed. Even the most alarming report, in 2023 from the National Institute for Public Health and the Environment (RIVM), seemed like a drop in the ocean.
The RIVM then noted that it is uncertain whether there will be enough water for the production of drinking water in 2030. All ten water companies, which have a legal obligation to supply drinking water, are faced with a multitude of problems that make water extraction increasingly difficult. There is just enough drinking water capacity nationally, but there are already problems regionally. There is already a shortage in three regions.
Immediate action was necessary, the RIVM wrote. Three years after the institute had drawn up an ‘escalation system for drinking water restrictions’, with which the government could intervene in the event of serious shortages. 2030 is now five years away.
That’s one this week Action Program Availability of Drinking Water Sources was presented is therefore very late. It is to be welcomed that the signatures of both the Minister of Infrastructure and Water Management, as well as those of the provinces and drinking water companies, are included below.
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The water from the tap must remain drinkable and affordable
At the same time, the Action Program is causing concern. It says nicely: “Together, the actions formulated at regional and national level can ensure that the drinking water supply is guaranteed in the period up to 2030.” The crucial sentence after that is: “Under the express condition that all parties involved can actually fulfill the agreements made in a timely manner.”
The chairman of the association of water companies Vewin sounded during the TV program News hour even less reassuring. He could not say with “100 percent certainty” that the required additional 100 million cubic meters will be available by 2030. The nice thing about the Action Program was that the parties “at least know where to find each other” and that everyone “recognises the importance”. As the saying goes: “That is (re)inventing hot water.” In other words: there should have been no need for an Action Program for this.
The urgency has been there for years, now action must be taken. By the government, which will have to give water companies priority over other space applicants. By the water companies themselves, who even in dry summers said that water would still come from the tap at one to twelve. By companies that have to ask themselves whether production processes require water of drinking water quality. And by the citizen, who uses 129 liters of drinking water every day. Of which 46 liters in the shower.