{"id":1171389,"date":"2026-08-27T00:57:23","date_gmt":"2026-08-27T00:57:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/1171389\/"},"modified":"2026-08-27T00:57:23","modified_gmt":"2026-08-27T00:57:23","slug":"bristol-water-hosepipe-ban-all-you-need-to-know","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/1171389\/","title":{"rendered":"Bristol Water hosepipe ban – all you need to know"},"content":{"rendered":"

Need to knowFor the first time in 50 years, 1.2 million people across a wide area around Bristol will be the subject of a hosepipe ban\"A<\/p>\n

A hosepipe ban is now in place(Image: PA)<\/p>\n

For the first time in 50 years, customers of Bristol Water will be banned from using hosepipes<\/a> as the drought of 2026 continues.<\/p>\n

Bristol Water announced the hosepipe ban today<\/a>, Wednesday, August 26, just a week after Wessex Water\u2019s hosepipe ban came into force.<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s everything you need to know about the ban.<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. When?<\/strong> The ban comes into force from midnight tonight, Wednesday<\/a>, so people waking up on Thursday morning, August 27, will not be able to use hosepipes or other similar devices. Bristol Water said the ban is \u2018temporary\u2019.<\/li>\n
  2. Where?<\/strong> Bristol Water\u2019s area covers around half a million households and more than 1.2 million people in an area that stretches from Street and Glastonbury in Somerset, across to Frome and Radstock, Bristol – but not Bath<\/a> – and up to Yate<\/a>, Thornbury<\/a> and into the Cotswolds in Tetbury.<\/li>\n
  3. What? <\/strong>The ban covers most outdoor, larger equipment that uses water – so that\u2019s hosepipes in the garden or to wash cars on the drive, using hosepipes to fill swimming pools or paddling pools, and also to clean patios or boats in a boatyard.<\/li>\n
  4. The ban doesn\u2019t cover regular household use of water – like tap water, drinking, flushing toilets, washing up, washing machines, brushing teeth, dishwashers, or filling watering cans to water the garden.<\/li>\n
  5. Why?<\/strong> The spring and summer of 2026 has seen drought conditions with a fraction of the usual rain. Ironically, the hosepipe ban comes into force on the same day as a Met Office weather<\/a> warning for heavy rain – but that will be the first measurable rain over Bristol and the surrounding area for months.<\/li>\n
  6. Much of the tap water for Bristol is abstracted from the Gloucester-Sharpness Canal, which in turn is fed by the River Severn. With the upper-reaches of the Severn also experiencing very low rainfall this year, the environment of the Severn past the point where it feeds into the canal is now in danger of being damaged by the water being taken out for Bristol. This is why Bristol Water have announced the hosepipe ban.<\/li>\n
  7. Breaking the hosepipe ban could lead to a \u00a31,000 fine. There are plenty of exemptions, however. You can still use a hosepipe to wash a car or vehicle if it’s at a car washing business, or if the vehicle you are washing is a commercial one – a taxi or works van. There are also exemptions for domestic customers who might not be able to water their garden with a watering can – people with a blue disabled badge, for example. This also applies to people on Bristol Water’s Priority Services Register (PSR) for medical or mobility reasons, or who receive support through the supplier’s WaterSure Plus tariff.<\/li>\n
  8. The ban applies to using a hosepipe to fill up or top up a garden pond, water feature or fountain, but there are exemptions here too. You still can use a hosepipe if you need to fill a pond to keep fish or other aquatic animals healthy, where a pond or pool is used as part of a recognised religious practice or you need to fill an ornamental fountain if it is needed to supply oxygen to fish. For a full list of exemptions – read this guide here<\/a>.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Need to knowFor the first time in 50 years, 1.2 million people across a wide area around Bristol…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1171390,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[8818],"tags":[381,748,393,728,2709,4884,14995,10301,16,15,14915],"class_list":["post-1171389","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-bristol","tag-bristol","tag-britain","tag-england","tag-environment","tag-glastonbury-festival","tag-great-britain","tag-sailing","tag-thornbury","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-yate"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/117164760691015106","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1171389","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1171389"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1171389\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1171390"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1171389"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1171389"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1171389"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}