Thames Water spills sewage ‘in every county it covers’
THAMES WATER has spilled sewage into every county it serves over the last three days in a potential breach of legal limits, new data reveal.
The water company has published a map showing each of its sewage spills in near real time, ahead of a government deadline for all water companies.
Updates yesterday showed that over the course of that day and the previous 48 hours, sewage overflows had occurred in 146 locations, in all 12
Thames Water counties that have monitors. Water companies are permitted to release sewage from overflow pipes, but this should be done on rare occasions and extreme weather conditions to stop the system being overloaded.
In some locations, the spills had been continuous since before the new year.
A sewage outflow at Ampney St Peter in the Cotswolds had been spilling for more than 543 hours, since December 20. Two more Cotswolds sites, at Fairford and Andersford had been discharging for more than 19 and 14 days, respectively.
The company said it was providing the information in order to help people “make more informed decisions”, amid concerns over swimming and other activities in sewage contaminated water.
Thames Water said it wasn’t able to immediately tell whether any of the discharges were compliant with permit conditions for the sites.
“Currently we carry out some analysis of the data we capture from our sites to assess whether a discharge was in line with permit conditions,” it said.
“Where we conclude that a discharge was non-compliant this is reported to the Environment Agency.”
A spokesman said: “We are absolutely committed to protecting and enhancing our rivers and the communities who love them, and we want to make these discharges of diluted sewage unnecessary as quickly as possible.
“The sites at Andoversford, Ampney St Peter and Fairford will be discharging because the flows being received exceed the capacity of the section of sewer. In these circumstances, the infrastructure is designed to discharge in this way, to prevent sewage backing up and flooding properties.”
The Environment Agency is investigating all of England’s combined water and sewerage companies for potentially criminal releases of sewage into rivers at more than 2,000 sites.