The bill became an Act of Parliament when Queen Victoria signed it on 21 July 1845. It authorised the building of Kentmere Head reservoir, with a capacity of impounded by an earth dam which was high. It collected water from an area of , which was relatively small, but the rainfall was high. It was situated in a region where there was a good supply of rock and boulder clay for the construction. The second reservoir was to be Skeggles Water, where a high dam would impound . It would gather water from an area of , and would have had the largest surface area of the reservoirs, at , as opposed to just for Kentmere Head. Three separate dams would have been built, and this reservoir was favoured by Bateman, because he thought it would cost the least, and would provide a similar yield to Kentmere Head. However, his estimates were wildly inaccurate, as was his prediction of the available rainfall.