United Kingdom, Aug. 13 -- The British public has been urged to delete their old emails to save water.

The Environment Agency has explained how people should clear unwanted messages from their inbox if they wish to reduce water usage during the current drought.

This year has seen the driest six months to July since 1976 in the UK and the current water shortfall in England has been described as a "nationally significant incident".

Along with more conventional methods of saving water - such as taking shorter showers, using rainwater stored in butts for watering plants and cutting hosepipe use - the government agency has drawn attention to the enormous demands that data storage places on utilities.

Emails and photos stored on the cloud a...