Environment Agency Knew Of Illegal Sewage Dumping
The Environment Agency knew raw sewage was being illegally dumped into English rivers from wastewater treatment works a decade ago, a leaked report shows.[…] The Environment Agency’s 2012 inspection report for the north-west region shows that a number of sewage works belonging to the water company United Utilities were dumping raw sewage into rivers while failing to treat the required amount of sewage stipulated in their permits.
In November, the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs announced that “several water companies had come forward” to say that “many of their sewage treatment works may not be compliant”, and that the Environment Agency and Ofwat had both launched sector-wide investigations into sewage dumping. Since then, we have had a clear plan to tackle these issues which has seen us invest millions of pounds installing more than 2,000 monitors and this has been an important factor in us achieving the top four star environmental rating five times in the last seven years.”
Although the report was written in 2012, the Environment Agency chief executive, Sir James Bevan, told the House of Commons environment, food and rural affairs committee in May this year, that “until recently, we have not had very good data about what is happening at sewage treatment works”.
In November, the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) announced that “several water companies had come forward” to say that “many of their sewage treatment works may not be compliant”, and that the Environment Agency and Ofwat had both launched sector-wide investigations into sewage dumping.
A whistleblower from the Environment Agency said the report “highlights how common” the practice is. “This was known in 2012 when self-regulation was pushed and water quality monitoring, staffing and regulation was dramatically cut,” they added. “The agency had an opportunity to prevent over 10 years of illegal sewage dumping but chose not to take it, despite the funding being available. They knowingly permitted the illegal activity to continue.”
The government’s recently published plan to reduce sewage spills “relies on self-reporting of sewage spills by the water industry”, said Prof Peter Hammond, formerly visiting scientist at the UK Centre for Ecology and Hydrology. But “close scrutiny of submissions to the Environment Agency suggests water companies cannot be trusted to provide complete and correct spill data”, he said. “The plan will fail unless the Environment Agency takes back control of all monitoring and dramatically improves its regulation,” he added