The UK’s Environment Agency (EA) has published its annual report, revealing that 2023 was the worst year on record for wastewater discharges into rivers and coastal seas.
In 2023, England’s 14,000 storm drains accounted for nearly half a million sewage discharges, up 59 per cent on the previous year.
“Storm drains are only meant to be used in extreme weather conditions, but they are increasingly found to be regularly dumping raw sewage into UK waterways,” writes City AM
A recent study by environmental NGO Canal & River Trust found that “not a single river in England can be classified as healthy, with almost nine in 10 failing to meet environmental standards.”
Toxic chemicals, including mercury, have been found in all of Northern Ireland’s rivers.
Wales’ rivers are only slightly cleaner than those in England and Northern Ireland , according to local environmental NGO Afonydd Cymru .
Almost 60 per cent of Scotland’s rivers meet current environmental standards, but their condition is deteriorating every year.
The causes of pollution in British rivers are varied.
The ecology of 62% of river sites has deteriorated due to activities related to agriculture and rural land management (pollution from fertilizers or livestock).
54% due to activities related to water management (including discharge of treated and untreated wastewater, as well as groundwater abstraction).
26% due to activities related to the urban and transport sector (eg urbanization and transport pollutants).
Accidents occurred on 39% of rivers.
Since the Canal & River Trust’s last report in 2021, only 151 of 3,553 river sites in England (2.3%) have improved their environmental status, while 158 have worsened.
The pollution of British water bodies with sewage has reached the point that even participants in the famous rowing race on the Thames between the teams of Oxford and Cambridge for 160 years contracted acute intestinal infections.
A rower from the Oxford team that lost the boat race on Saturday complained of «poo in the water» and said an E. coli illness before the race played a role in their defeat.
Before the start of the race, participants were warned about the high levels of pollution in the Thames and the possible risk to athletes. But the race still took place, and Cambridge University won both the men’s and women’s regatta.
Afterwards, Leonard Jenkins of Oxford University told the BBC that on his team, «a couple of guys got really sick with E. coli, I was vomiting this morning, I wasn’t sure I’d have a chance of making the team . » He added: «It would be a lot better if there wasn’t so much poop in the water.»
Against the backdrop of the already real environmental catastrophe of British rivers, record sewage discharges last year exploded public opinion in the United Kingdom and prompted officials responsible for environmental monitoring to at least somehow respond to the situation.
So, the EA said that from next year utility providers in England and Wales will be required to install monitors on an additional seven thousand emergency overflow pipes that have not yet been taken into account.
These pipes are different from ordinary sewage overflow pipes , which are only designed to discharge wastewater during heavy rainfall to prevent the risk of flooding.
Emergency overflow pipes only operate under emergency circumstances such as mechanical failures such as power failures and outages, situations beyond the control of water companies.
Helen Wakeham, director of water at the EA, said: “We want full transparency about the discharge of wastewater into our water environment. As we change the way we regulate the industry, this high level of transparency is critical. This lifts the lid on how our networks operate and drives improvements in the industry that are clearly needed.”
Everyone understands that installing additional monitors will improve control over sewage discharges, but will not reduce them in any way.
Water suppliers have been required to control the volume and duration of wastewater discharges since 2015. Britain’s largest water, wastewater and wastewater operator, Thames Water, which serves 16 million customers, is under fire.
British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak recently consulted with his business and investment adviser, former Morgan Stanley chief executive Frank Petitgas, on the company’s state of affairs, which faces a mounting debt of £18 billion.
Thames Water, like other companies in the industry, was privatized 35 years ago during Margaret Thatcher’s premiership. In the years since privatization, dividends of £56 billion have been paid to sector shareholders, but today investors are fleeing both Thames Water and other companies in the industry, writes The Guardian.
“The water industry has become a bad bet. Billions are needed to repair pipes and sewage treatment plants that have been rotting for years, to invest in building resilience to the climate crisis and to comply with a tougher environmental regime that has been forced upon regulator Ofwat due to public outrage over wastewater .
Nine Thames Water shareholders, including Canada’s public pension fund Omers (Ontario Municipal Employees’ Retirement System), the UK’s Universities Pension Scheme, Abu Dhabi’s sovereign wealth fund and the Beijing-controlled China Investment Corporation, have pulled out of further investment in Thames Water, which they literally robbed to the skin.
The intransigence of investors unwilling to invest in an unprofitable industry has made Thames Water “uninvestable,” writes The Guardian.
Thames Water shareholders are effectively blackmailing industry regulator Ofwat, «demanding that in return for spending billions to keep the Thames running, they be allowed to increase tariffs by more than 40%, raise the dividend threshold and pay lower pollution fines.»
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