Thames Water has bowed to pressure from MPs, the Council and residents over demands to hold further consultation on a controversial drought scheme that could threaten river life.

The company has drawn up plans to take up to 75m litres of water a day from the River Thames some 300m upstream of Teddington Lock and replace it with treated effluent from the Mogden sewage works.

Thames Water claims this is the cheapest and quickest way of capturing water than will be sent via pipeline and tunnel under the capital to homes and businesses in east London.

However, critics fear it will change the chemical make-up and temperature of the Thames as it flows through Richmond borough, so harming, fish, insect and plant life.

There are also concerns that the raid on the river could make it difficult for boats to move up and down the Thames. A petition opposing the scheme has already been signed by more than 8,000 people.

Opponents argue the company should concentrate on cutting the 635m litres of water lost through leaks in its system every day.

Nub News revealed details of the scheme last month https://richmond.nub.news/news/local-news/plan-to-drain-water-from-thames-and-replace-it-with-treated-effluent-166175

Subsequently, we published an image of what the abstraction point will look like on the banks of the Thames - https://teddington.nub.news/news/local-news/revealed-concrete-structures-could-be-built-on-banks-of-thames-for-controversial-drought-scheme-168620

A public consultation event was held recently in Richmond, however the venue proved too small to cope with the demand from residents, who were left queuing outside.

Now the company has agreed to hold an online webinar with a Q&A on February 27, while there will be a public event at the Council's York House head offices on March 3. Details can be found here - https://thames-wrmp.co.uk/hearing-your-views/our-events/

The Twickenham MP, Munira Wilson, heralded the breakthrough, saying: "Very pleased that Thames Water has listened to my calls for further public consultation events, including one on the Teddington side of the river."

Thames Water said: "Our water supply is under severe pressure and we must plan ahead to build future resilience for the benefit of our customers and the environment.

"We have recently published our draft Water Resources Management Plan and launched a public consultation on it.

"It explains how we will meet the water resource challenge through a combination of fixing leaks more rapidly, finding ways to reduce the amount of water we all use and by investing in new infrastructure including a new river abstraction near Teddington Lock, a new reservoir in Oxfordshire, and water transfers between regions and across the South East."