Guidance
Protect groundwater and prevent groundwater pollution
Understand when your activities affect groundwater, what permissions you may need and how to prevent pollution.
Documents
Details
Use this guide to understand:
- what groundwater is and how your activity might affect it
- permissions you need to discharge to or abstract from groundwater
- how vulnerable your location is to groundwater pollution
- the designated groundwater protection zones
This guidance is for planners, applicants for environmental permits and abstraction licences, and landowners concerned with the quality and quantity of groundwater.
Updates to this page
Published 14 March 2017Last updated 1 August 2024 + show all updates
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Updated the guidance 'Protect groundwater and prevent groundwater pollution' to clarify the definition of groundwater - Water stored in geological strata (for example, in rocks) below the water table is called groundwater.
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First published.