The legal model works relatively well when these events happen infrequently, notes Purnell. And since the sewage is mixed with stormwater in these events it should be highly diluted.<\/p>\n
The problem is that these legal discharges are happening far more than many realised and may be more concentrated. Michelle Walker<\/a>, technical director of The Rivers Trust, says overflows of untreated sewage are being routinely used even when it hasn\u2019t been raining.<\/p>\n Read more about pollution:<\/strong><\/p>\n She attributes this to three causes: investment in the sewer network and treatment facilities failing to keep pace with pressures such as population growth; more intense rainstorms due to climate change<\/a>; and more runoff from urban areas as more and more green spaces are paved over.<\/p>\n As well as being unpleasant, people swimming or boating in untreated wastewater are at risk of coming into contact with disease-causing pathogens and developing gastrointestinal illnesses or respiratory, eye and ear infections.<\/p>\n \u201cIf you\u2019re going to recreationally swim after rainfall events, you\u2019re more likely to come across discharges in those conditions, and the chance of you getting sick is likely to be greater,\u201d says Purnell. Sewage discharges also significantly impact the ecological quality of rivers, she adds.<\/p>\n Purnell notes these overflows are likely not a new issue but have become more visible as the UK has begun to monitor them more effectively. Since 2020, the Environment Agency has required water companies to monitor and report on how often and for how long storm overflows are used<\/a>. However, \u201cwe still don\u2019t know the volume of wastewater that gets discharged\u201d, notes Purnell.<\/p>\n Hugo Tagholm<\/a>, chief executive of the charity Surfers Against Sewage, which runs an online map showing up-to-date warnings of discharges<\/a>, argues the water industry and regulatory bodies have cut financial corners in favour of \u201cgreedy shareholders\u201d.<\/p>\n \u201cOur beaches, rivers and lakes are some of our most precious natural resources, but water companies are treating them as an open sewer, devastating wildlife and posing serious health risks to all those who attempt to enjoy them.\u201d<\/p>\n An Environment Agency criminal regulatory investigation<\/a> into sewage discharges at wastewater treatment works in England is currently ongoing. Its initial analysis in May found that there \u201cmay have been widespread and serious non-compliance with the relevant regulations<\/a>\u201d.<\/p>\n In response to concerns over sewage discharges, in late August the government announced a plan requiring water companies to invest \u00a356bn to improve all storm overflows by 2050<\/a>, and by 2035 for storm overflows discharging near designated bathing waters and certain protected natural sites.<\/p>\n But Walker says the government\u2019s plan is \u201ctoo little, too late\u201d and doesn\u2019t go far or fast enough to tackle the problem. She says stronger regulation and enforcement of the privatised water industry is needed.<\/p>\n She also calls for leadership from the government to \u201cwork with nature\u201d to reduce the pressure of rainfall entering the sewer network. Measures to do this include increasing the use of water butts and rain gardens to reduce urban runoff, using wetlands to clean up sewage pollution, and expanding ponds and dams upstream as a form of natural flood management, she says<\/p>\n These measures would also reduce agricultural pollution runoff, keep rivers flowing in dry periods, reduce flood risk and help to tackle the climate and biodiversity crisis, she notes.<\/p>\n Purnell also says nature-based solutions are useful.<\/p>\n \u201cAnything we can do to slow down runoff or infiltration of that rainfall to the sewage network will help ultimately,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n Areas with the most problems with discharges could be targeted to implement these sustainable drainage solutions, she adds. And all new housing estates and new builds should also be thinking about slowing down water paths.<\/p>\n But water and sewage companies also need to invest into upgrading their infrastructure, Purnell says, through storage or increased treatment capacities. A longer-term solution would be to redesign the UK\u2019s system to deal with rainfall runoff separately to sewage, she adds, although noting this would be difficult and expensive and is the \u201cleast realistic\u201d solution in the short term.<\/p>\n Meanwhile, the UK also needs to focus on gaining a real understanding of the current discharges, says Prof Andrew C Johnson<\/a>, environmental research scientist at the UK Centre for Ecology and Hydrology.<\/p>\n He says two critical pieces are missed by current monitoring: the volumes of untreated sewage being discharged, and whether it is happening more frequently now than in the past. To truly assess the risks, he says, both the volume of sewage overflows and the water quality downstream from these overflows need to be measured.<\/p>\n Read more about the environment:<\/strong><\/p>\n By Jocelyn Timperley Published: Thursday, 22 September 2022 at 12:00 am In recent months there have been fresh concerns over a wave of discharges of untreated raw sewage in the UK. At one point in early September, the Safer Seas and Rivers Service, which is run by the charity Surfers Against Sewage (SAS), issued pollution […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":17958,"template":"","categories":[1],"acf":{"readingTimeMinutes":"5"},"uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/42\/2022\/09\/untreated-sewage-is-being-pumped-onto-british-beaches-and-the-problem-may-be-worse-than-we-think.jpg",1200,745,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/42\/2022\/09\/untreated-sewage-is-being-pumped-onto-british-beaches-and-the-problem-may-be-worse-than-we-think-150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/42\/2022\/09\/untreated-sewage-is-being-pumped-onto-british-beaches-and-the-problem-may-be-worse-than-we-think-300x186.jpg",300,186,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/42\/2022\/09\/untreated-sewage-is-being-pumped-onto-british-beaches-and-the-problem-may-be-worse-than-we-think-768x477.jpg",768,477,true],"large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/42\/2022\/09\/untreated-sewage-is-being-pumped-onto-british-beaches-and-the-problem-may-be-worse-than-we-think-1024x636.jpg",800,497,true],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/42\/2022\/09\/untreated-sewage-is-being-pumped-onto-british-beaches-and-the-problem-may-be-worse-than-we-think.jpg",1200,745,false],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/42\/2022\/09\/untreated-sewage-is-being-pumped-onto-british-beaches-and-the-problem-may-be-worse-than-we-think.jpg",1200,745,false]},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"importmanagerhub@sprylab.com","author_link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/author\/importmanagerhubsprylab-com\/"},"uagb_comment_info":0,"uagb_excerpt":"By Jocelyn Timperley Published: Thursday, 22 September 2022 at 12:00 am In recent months there have been fresh concerns over a wave of discharges of untreated raw sewage in the UK. At one point in early September, the Safer Seas and Rivers Service, which is run by the charity Surfers Against Sewage (SAS), issued pollution…","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rss_feed\/17957"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rss_feed"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/rss_feed"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/24"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/17958"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17957"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17957"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"""\"](\""https:\/\/images.immediate.co.uk\/production\/volatile\/sites\/4\/2022\/09\/GettyImages-1393140990-4e5e303.jpg?quality=90&resize=620%2C410"\" "\\"\"\"\\"\/")
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