The official interdepartmental decree will be taken in the next few hours but already, this Monday evening, the prefecture of the Île-de-France region announces the placement of Paris and its small crown in level 1 called “vigilance” drought. “According to the last low water bulletin published on July 25, 2022”says a press release, “the flow of the Seine fell below the threshold set at 81 m³/s at the Paris-Austerlitz station. Under the interdepartmental framework decree of July 11, crossing this threshold implies going to level 1 called drought “vigilance”.
In concrete terms, the level of “vigilance” is the first of the four levels of drought (vigilance, alert, heightened alert, crisis) and it does not require the authorities to take binding restriction measures on the use of water. He plans only incentives and awareness measures for water saving for individuals as well as for professionals and communities.
Ile-de-France residents are therefore invited to:
- limit secondary uses: car cleaning, outdoor washing, etc.
- reduce the washing of roads and sidewalks to what is strictly necessary for health
- reduce domestic water consumption
- limit watering of green spaces and avoid watering during the hottest hours.
An already dry autumn and spring
The drought of this summer 2022 had already been preparing for several months in Île-de-France. “Since autumn 2021, we have observed below-normal precipitation over a large part of the metropolitan territory, including in Île-de-France”specifies the regional prefecture. “The rainfall deficit worsened in the spring, with particularly dry weather conditions and above-normal temperatures.”
Essonne, Yvelines, Val d’Oise and Seine-et-Marne had already been affected by restriction orders for several days.