Water restrictions that have been in place across the Dublin region since October 30th are to be lifted tonight.

Dublin City Council says this is due to an increase in production at the Ballymore Eustace plant and improvements in storage at treated water reservoirs.

It adds that a significant amount of water has been saved and that the "unsustainably low level" has improved over the past week.

But in a statement the Council says "We will be keeping reduced water pressure in place in the evenings over the coming weeks, to gain additional treated water storage", which it adds is "normal practice at this time of year...to plan ahead for the high demand Christmas season".

The Environment Minister Phil Hogan has welcomed the move.

"I must commend the tireless efforts made by the engineers in Dublin City Council in getting this matter sorted out. They were faced with an unprecedented situation on which they worked around the clock to resolve".

The Minister had previously been critical of Dublin City Council, and called on the authority to issue pre-warnings in the future.

Phil Hogan told The Pat Kenny Show here on Newstalk "Dublin City Council should learn from this experience, we shouldn't hear about it from the media yesterday morning that we have a problem. There should be a communication plan in place and that didn't happen on this occasion and hopefully we will learn a lesson from that."