Drinking Water Protected Area

Published by:
Natural Resources Wales
Last updated:
24 October 2025
Topic:
Not added
Licence:
None

Summary

Any water bodies in Wales used to provide drinking water are designated as Drinking Water Protected Areas (DrWPAs). The designation aims to protect the water and prevent any deterioration in quality that could increase the required treatment of water to meet Drinking Water Standards.

Drinking Water Protected Areas need to be identified under the Water Environment (Water Framework Directive) (England and Wales) Regulations 2017.

This data shows the designated Drinking Water Protected Areas in Wales and is split into two separate layers for Surface Water Drinking Water Protected Areas and one for Groundwater Drinking Water Protected Areas. This aims to protect from over-abstraction and prevent deterioration in water quality that could increase the treatment of drinking water.

Within these Drinking Water Protected Areas, we work with water companies to identify raw water sources that are 'at risk' of deterioration, which would result in the need for additional treatment.

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Link to the data Format File added Data preview
Web Mapping Service N/A 24 October 2025 Not available
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Additional information

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Added to data.gov.uk
2025-03-04
Access contraints
There are no access restrictions on this data. NRW may release, publish or disseminate it freely.
Harvest GUID
NRW_DS161272
Extent
Latitude: 53.427° to °
Longitude: -5.311° to -2.647°
Spatial reference system
Dataset reference date
2024-07-31 (publication)
Frequency of update
asNeeded
Responsible party
Natural Resources Wales (NRW) (publisher, owner, originator, distributor); Natural Resources Wales (custodian)
ISO 19139 resource type
dataset
Metadata language
eng
Source Metadata
XML
HTML

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