By 1970 there were just five mills operational on the Kent. The Water Resources Act 1963 established 27 River Authorities to replace the 32 River Boards existing at that time. The Kent was within the jurisdiction of the Lancashire River Authority, and section 58 of the Act gave them powers to charge mills for each thousand gallons abstracted from a river for the generation of power, even though the water was returned to the river a little further downstream. This effectively killed the use of water power, and Croppers, who used water to drive turbines which generated electricity to power their mill at Burneside, could no longer afford the cost, and the turbines were shut down in 1972.