Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, pursuant to the answer provided on 14th July 2026, to Question 16496, on Water Abstraction: (a) what determination she made of the flow rate, measured at the Kingston gauge, that would trigger operation of the Teddington Direct River Abstraction Scheme, and (b) given that trigger event and based on historical river flow data, what assessment has she made of the average incremental cost per megalitre over the lifetime of the scheme.

The proposed Teddington Direct River Abstraction is an intermittent drought resilience scheme triggered by river flow and reservoir storage conditions through the Lower Thames Control Diagram and does not have a single flow-rate trigger at the Kingston gauge.

Thames Water's Gate 3 submission indicates operation may be triggered when naturalised flow over Teddington Weir falls to around 3,000 Ml/d on average for 10 days during a qualifying drought event, alongside relevant reservoir storage thresholds.