SRA Annual Report 2025-26: River Brue modelling
SRA-funded modelling of flood risk reduction options for the River Brue’s lower catchment was completed in 2025-26. This work followed on from an earlier SRA-funded study of how much water the Brue conveys, and how water moves – and is moved – around its lowlands.
The aim of both these studies was to seek general agreement about which potential improvements would work best and how to reconcile any competing interests.
The options modelling was led by Somerset Council, working as an SRA partner with AW Water Engineering Ltd and WSP as consultants. They considered eight options singly, plus five combined options. Combined options included silt removal and other methods of increasing watercourses’ capacity for conveying water, structural improvements to flood defences, bank repairs, and changes to operational procedures.
In December 2025 the SRA Board noted that only Combined Option 1, for Brue conveyance improvements, had a Benefit Cost Ratio of more than 1 when flood risk benefits alone are assessed.
The Board heard that it is hard to assemble conventionally strong business cases for flood risk reduction works in the Brue lowlands, because of low densities of homes, businesses and critically important infrastructure. However, members agreed that if the scope of future works could be extended to include less tangible benefits (such as amenity, ecology and health), this could strengthen rationales for investment.
The project’s steering group had its last meeting in April 2026. As a result, different organisations are now focusing on four main ideas. The first involves formally lowering water levels in the Huntspill before predicted floods. (The Huntspill was created in the early years of World War Two primarily to hold and supply the huge quantities of water needed to help make explosives at Puriton, but it was also intended to serve as a flood relief channel).
Other possible moves include getting low spots raised in the banks of the Brue; increasing conveyance through pinch points on the Brue downstream of the Cripps River; and tie-ups with other strategies and initiatives such as Somerset’s Local Nature Recovery Strategy and the Agratas battery factory being built at Puriton.
SRA partners will take such actions forward as part of their usual work through selecting works, securing funding and permissions, producing detailed designs and implementing them.