Latest news with #waterCompanies
The Guardian
09-07-2025
- Health
- The Guardian
Environment Agency insider alleges ‘cover-up' over sewage sludge on farmland
An Environment Agency (EA) insider has broken ranks to expose what they describe as a 'deliberate and ongoing cover-up' of the public health and environmental dangers of spreading sewage sludge on farmland. They accuse the regulator and government of colluding with water companies for years to facilitate the dumping of waste under the guise of soil enrichment – without oversight, transparency or testing. 'This has been going on for decades,' they said. 'The sludge regime is still being run under guidance created by the water companies. And when the Environment Agency finally funded research that uncovered real dangers, they buried it.' Sewage sludge – the solid byproduct of wastewater treatment – is promoted as a sustainable fertiliser that returns nutrients to the soil, but it can also carry toxic substances from industrial and domestic waste. Before the practice was banned in the 1990s, sludge was routinely dumped at sea; now it is spread on land. Rules since 1989 only require the sludge to be tested for a narrow range of heavy metals. Other substances, including pharmaceuticals, Pfas 'forever chemicals', flame retardants, microplastics, endocrine disruptors, are neither regulated nor tested for. Voluntary guidance drawn up in 1998 by the water industry, the safe sludge matrix, sets out what types of treated sludge can be spread and where. 'The matrix is still in use,' the insider said. 'It was written by the water companies and simply accepted by the Environment Agency.' An industry expert agreed, saying: 'It's a PR exercise. The treatment doesn't remove a huge range of pollutants, just pathogens.' A second EA source said the matrix was designed to 'protect [companies'] access to the land bank' – to reassure farmers and fend off regulation. The EA has long known sludge is a problem. In 2017, it commissioned a study to investigate. The insider said that although the study was praised internally, it then disappeared. 'It was wiped. When journalists asked about it, the agency said it didn't exist.' Greenpeace's Unearthed team uncovered the study through freedom of information legislation. It revealed flame retardants, dioxins and microplastics had been identified in sludge samples. 'The EA denied its existence until the evidence was overwhelming. Then they said, 'OK, it exists, but we're not giving it to you,'' the insider said. After the report's exposure in 2020, the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and the EA announced a new sludge strategy to modernise the system and bring it under environmental permitting, with promises of better tracking, data and enforcement. But nothing has been delivered. 'It was political theatre,' the insider said. 'Throw out a strategy, let it sit on the shelf, say it'll be reviewed next year. Hope the public forgets.' If the agency had been serious, they added, it would have expanded the list of substances water companies must test for. Instead, nothing changed. 'The regulators and government are complicit. There's too much money in sludge – cost savings and profits. Water companies have too much influence.' In 2024, the campaign group Fighting Dirty launched a legal challenge seeking stronger standards for sewage sludge, but lost. Sign up to Down to Earth The planet's most important stories. Get all the week's environment news - the good, the bad and the essential after newsletter promotion Georgia Elliott-Smith, Fighting Dirty's director, said: 'Water company executives and shareholders receive enormous payouts while environmental and health hazards are ignored. Worse, this suggests a deliberate pay-to-pollute arrangement. It's sickening that water companies struck a deal with Ofwat allowing them to pass clean-up costs to consumers. Government must intervene.' Dr Joanna Cloy, from the environmental charity Fidra, said: 'Until companies invest in better treatment and infrastructure, unregulated contaminants from urban, industrial and hospital waste will keep flowing into sludge.' Richard Benwell, the CEO of Wildlife and Countryside Link, said: 'Sewage sludge without strong regulation creates a toxic cycle in UK food and water systems. Chemicals in sludge pollute soils and crops, then run-off re-pollutes water. Monitoring focuses only on heavy metals. Government must set standards to restrict harmful agricultural chemicals and enforce polluter-pays rules.' 'Regulation of sewage sludge is completely inadequate with monitoring focusing only on heavy metals. The government must move swiftly to set standards to restrict and enforce the levels of these harmful chemicals in use in agriculture, alongside setting tough 'polluter pays' responsibilities for the companies that are producing these pollutants in the first place.' Dr David Tompkins, a soil and waste expert and associate director at consulting firm WSP said, 'We'd like to see a stronger application of the precautionary principle to protect soils and ecosystems pending further studies. We know sludge contains Pfas, plastics, and other chemicals – but we don't know the impact on soils. Instead of stopping until we do, we carry on because real change costs money.' 'Proper regulation –bringing contaminants in sludge down to safe levels – would cost more than burning or dumping it,' the EA insider said. 'So they won't do it. They'll never set targets because the price is too high. The only fixes are to ban sludge spreading or stop toxic waste entering sewers – and Defra and the EA want neither. They just pretend change is coming.' Water UK acknowledged bioresources may contain Pfas and microplastics but said there are no legal standards or detection methods, and setting such standards is a matter for government and regulators. It said the industry is backing research and calling for coordinated international action. The EA said it enforces strict controls to prevent sludge from harming soil and water, including thousands of inspections and followup actions annually. Defra said it had launched an independent water commission to review sludge regulation and is working with the EA, farmers and companies to ensure safe use.
Telegraph
20-05-2025
- Business
- Telegraph
Water companies face wave of criminal investigations
Criminal investigations into water companies are at a record high amid a crackdown on illegal sewage dumping. A total of 81 investigations have been opened, after spot checks at company premises and rivers jumped 400 per cent in the past year. Breaches of environmental permits, such as releasing excessive pollution into rivers or failing to carry out water quality monitoring, are criminal offences. Thames Water faces the highest number of criminal investigations, 31, while Anglian Water has 22, according to government figures. Under new laws, water company executives could face as long as two years in prison for obstructing an investigation. If found guilty, they could be jailed for up to five years and their firms fined hundreds of millions of pounds. Sir Adrian Montague, the chairman of Thames Water, appeared in front of MPs earlier this month to defend handing out six-figure bonuses. He argued that the firm needed to 'reward its staff effectively' to ensure they would not be poached by rival businesses. But Downing Street today appeared to hit back at his remarks, as the Prime Minister's spokesman said: 'Water bosses rewarding themselves for failure is clearly not acceptable.' 'The new Ofwat powers that are set out in the Water Act and will be coming into effect shortly will be applied retrospectively, meaning that they apply to Thames Water, just as they will any other company.' Steve Reed, the Environment Secretary, said that water bosses who were breaking the law would 'finally be punished'. He added: 'Water companies have too often gone unpunished as they pump record levels of sewage into our waterways. No more. 'A record number of criminal investigations have been launched into law-breaking water companies – which could see bosses behind bars. 'With this Government, water companies who break the law will finally be punished for their disgraceful behaviour so we can clean up our rivers, lakes and seas for good.' Mr Reed also confirmed that Thames Water had 'withdrawn' plans to pay senior bosses large bonuses, something the water company had said was necessary to secure a £3 billion emergency loan. Thames Water's chairman earlier admitted incorrectly stating that the so-called retention plan was 'insisted upon' by the company's lenders. Philip Duffy, chief executive of the Environment Agency, said: 'Our message to the industry is clear: we expect full compliance throughout the water system, and we will not hesitate to take robust enforcement action where we identify serious breaches.' Government figures show the regulator carried out an average of nine investigations a month between July 2024 and March this year. That compared with 187 criminal investigations launched in the period from April 2020 to June 2024, an average of 3.6 per month. But critics said that the attempts at a crackdown had not gone far enough. 'National scandal' Tim Farron, the Liberal Democrats' environment spokesman, said: 'Eighty-one investigations does not even begin to address the sewage scandal that has plagued British rivers and seas for far too long. 'This is a national scandal which got far worse under the Conservatives' watch. Their record is one of rising sewage levels and water firms stuffing their pockets with cash. 'And now, the Government's attempt to tackle the crisis is a job half done. A toothless regulator will fail to end the scandal of multi-million pound bonuses for sewage dumpers.'
The Guardian
20-05-2025
- Business
- The Guardian
Thames Water and Anglian Water face 53 criminal investigations over sewage
Two of Britain's biggest water companies, Thames Water and Anglian Water, face more than 50 criminal investigations between them as part of a crackdown on sewage dumping, the government has said. The utilities were subject to the bulk of a record 81 investigations into water companies between last July's general election and March 2025, according to new data. New powers to claw back the costs of the Environment Agency investigations will be used, meaning the 'polluter will pay', sources told the Guardian. This could prove very costly for Thames, the heavily indebted supplier that topped the charts of active investigations at 31 and will probably have to fund the majority of them. Britain's biggest water company, which recently came within five weeks of running out of funds, attempted to persuade the water regulator to let it off hundreds of millions of pounds of fines. Significant further costs could risk tipping it into a special administration, a form of nationalisation. Thames Water is rushing to find a buyer willing to inject cash as it teeters on the brink of temporary nationalisation. The company, which has 16 million customers and 8,000 employees, is labouring under £20bn of debt. The US private equity firm KKR, which hopes to acquire a £4bn stake, is the last option for Thames Water as it scrambles to find a buyer by the end of June. Anglian Water has faced 22 investigations since last July. Sources in the environment department said that they had directed the Environment Agency to take robust action and hoped to see water executives in court in coming months. After these investigations, water bosses could be jailed for two years and water companies fined hundreds of millions of pounds. Steve Reed, the environment secretary, said: 'Not only did the Conservatives oversee record levels of sewage dumping, they also shamelessly tried to cover it up. 'And Reform didn't even mention sewage in their manifesto; Nigel Farage simply doesn't care about our beautiful rivers, lakes and seas. Sign up to Down to Earth The planet's most important stories. Get all the week's environment news - the good, the bad and the essential after newsletter promotion 'This Labour government is cleaning up the foul mess the Tories left behind with a record number of criminal investigations into lawbreaking water companies – which could see bosses behind bars.' It is a criminal offence for a water company to break the rules of its environmental permit. This can include releasing excessive pollution into a river or failing to carry out water quality monitoring. The Environment Agency has hired 380 extra regulatory staff to carry out inspections and other enforcement activity. James Wallace, the chief executive of River Action, said: 'Criminal investigations are welcome, but regulators need urgent access to courts and if the upcoming spending review slashes Environment Agency funding, how will it sustain the level of enforcement needed to hold polluters to account – from water companies to factory farms? Tough talk needs backing with real resources.' Thames Water, Anglian Water and Water UK, the industry body, have been contacted for comment.
