Water & Wastewater Treatment Magazine
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Databank www.wwtonline.co.uk | WWT | AUGUST 2019 | 29 The Environment Agency described the performance of England's nine water and sewage companies as "simply unacceptable" in July aer the release of the 2018 data showed serious pollutions had risen and that Northumbrian Water was the only company to get a four- star rating. The report showed the overall performance had deteriorated, reversing a trend of improvement since 2011, and that Northumbrian, which had been rated at two stars for the previous two years, was the only company to have enhanced its rating. The EA puts pollution incidents into three catego- ries. Category 1 incidents have a serious, extensive or persistent impact on the environment, people or prop- erty; category 2 incidents have a lesser, yet significant, impact; and category 3 inci- dents have a minor or mini- mal impact on the environ- ment, people or property with only a limited or localised effect on water quality. Last year, the number of serious pollution incidents (categories 1 and 2) rose for the first time since 2013, with Severn Trent, Southern Water, Wessex Water and Yorkshire Water all seeing increases. EA chair Emma Howard Boyd said the regulator was "not seeing dramatic improvements in 2019" and added: "As a result we will toughen our regulatory ap- proach. "We will increase our inspections and auditing of companies' performance. We will launch a new programme called 'Improving Water Com- pany Performance'. This will focus on the poor performing companies and on tackling the behaviour which is doing most damage to the environment. "This includes failure to prevent serious pollution in- cidents, noncompliance with permits and the wrong use of sludge. We will continue to work with Ofwat, the eco- nomic regulator, and we will prioritise looking at financial penalties to drive better envi- ronmental performance." POLLUTION INCIDENTS 56 Total number of serious pollution incidents (categories 1 and 2) attributable to the English WASCs in 2018, up from 52 in 2017 0.1 United Utilities had the lowest number of serious pollution incidents per 10,000km of sewer in 2018 9 Total number of the most serious pollution incidents (category 1) attributable to the English WASCs in 2018, down from 11 in 2017 2.3 Yorkshire Water had the highest number of serious pollution incidents per 10,000km of sewer in 2018 1,863 Total number of pollution incidents (categories 1, 2 and 3) attributable to the English WASCs in 2018, up from 1,827 in 2017 Environmental Performance Assessment 2018 Number of category 1 and 2 pollution incidents for the nine WASCs in England 2013 88 2014 61 2016 57 2015 59 2017 52 2018 56 Source: Environment Agency Source: Environment Agency Star rating (out of 4) Total pollution incidents per 10,000km of sewer Serious pollution incidents per 10,000km of sewer Discharge permit compliance % Self- reported pollution incidents % AMP/NEP scheme delivery % Security of supply index (SoSI) Anglian Water *** 25 0.8 98.2 62 100 100 Northumbrian Water **** 12 0.3 99.4 84 100 100 Severn Trent *** 31 0.6 98.4 79 100 100 South West Water ** 39 1.8 99.1 83 100 98 Southern Water ** 98 1.2 98.7 77 100 100 Thames Water *** 27 0.8 99 76 100 98 United Utilities *** 24 0.1 98.7 79 98.6 100 Wessex Water *** 24 1.2 100 74 100 100 Yorkshire Water ** 44 2.3 97.5 73 100 100 AVERAGE 31 0.9 98.6 76 99.8 99.6 Source: Environment Agency n Better than target n Slightly worse than target n Significantly worse than target