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Oil tank grant scheme

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The Downs and Harbours' clean water partnership covers an area which is largely rural. In this area many of the residents own oil tanks to heat their homes during winter, however if they are single skinned or have cracks, oil may seep into the environment and if in a groundwater protected area could contaminate drinking water supplies.
Therefore Portsmouth Water are offering an oil tank grant to those eligible to mitigate against this risk. See more information below.

Portsmouth Water grant

 

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Portsmouth Water offer a free tank inspection if your property is above groundwater used for public drinking supply. We also offer a 50% grant towards replacement works if you are in a high risk groundwater protection zone and your heating oil system poses a risk to groundwater. The high risk factors include:

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  • Tanks that are over 20 years old 

  • Tanks in poor conditions

  • Single-skinned tanks

  • Inappropriate supporting base

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To find out more please read the leaflet below or get in contact with the catchment management team at Portsmouth water via: catchment.management@portsmouthwater.co.uk

There are currently no grants available for 2024-25 for Oil Tank replacements. 

Who is eligible?

The oil tank grant is available for oil tanks located within our Source Protection Zones 1 & 2 (red and green areas on the map below). To find out if you're eligible, please contact catchment.management@portsmouthwater.co.uk

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To hear about how we've helped other homeowners protect their oil tanks, check out some of our case studies by following the link below:

Why is Portsmouth Water interested in your heating oil?

A lot of the drinking water in the south of England is extracted from underground Chalk ‘aquifers’.  These are called ‘Source Protection Zones’. These aquifers supply us with clean drinking water. Spills from domestic heating oil can potentially contaminate this important resource.

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In the event of aquifer contamination from domestic heating oil, there’s no risk to our consumers because abstraction of water would be stopped from the contaminated source. Any action that Portsmouth Water must take during a spillage event  costs us a lot of time, money and effort which can ultimately effect customer billing.

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So that’s why we work with the Environment Agency, www.homespillinsurance.co.uk, www.oftec.org.uk and others to do all we can to influence people to look after their oil in the first place.

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Drinking Water Quality is of concern to us all. To find out more about water quality standards, the monitoring we do and the major issues affecting water quality, click here.

What to do if you have a leak?

  • Be safe (for example no smoking).

  • If safe to do so, collect dripping or leaking oil in a suitable container.

  • Stop the oil from entering drains or watercourses by containing it with sand or earth.

  • Don’t spread the oil by hosing it down. Don’t add detergents.

  • Call the UK pollution incident hotline 24 hours a day

0800 80 70 60

For more advice and guidance follow the link below for the Environment Agency's Oil Care Campaign website

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