Water & Wastewater Treatment Magazine
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Project focus: catchment permitting 20 | OCTOBER 2016 | WWT | www.wwtonline.co.uk traditional way of making step changes in environmental outcomes, but in this instance, it is changing the way we are regulated that enables that improve- ment. We need to look at all possible ways of improvement at lower cost and so for us, it's a no-brainer. "If we can get this approach to work for us, as part of a one-to-one relationship with the regulator, then it may well work to extend that thinking to a wider group of stakeholders, tying all the people who contribute towards watercourse quality in a catchment into the same environmental outcome. Once this trial has proven its worth, then that will be the next step forward." Hickey says that catchment permitting is an approach that could be applied to other parameters than phosphorus, although it is likely to be the most relevant parameter in the short term as it is the substance in the Water Framework Directive that is falling most heavily on water companies. Innovative work is also underway in water companies on tertiary treatments to complement chemical dosing; achieving good ecological status under the WFD will also require getting to grips with pollution from diffuse sources, from agriculture and elsewhere. However, catchment permitting is an approach that can complement this other work and can achieve real progress on phosphorus at a more affordable cost. "One of the things that's really important for us in this is we want to create an environment for innovation," concludes Hickey. "We want to get people to think laterally about how to achieve environmental standards in different ways, and we would flex regulation to encourage that. "We've been actively promoting this and I've personally written to all the water companies setting out the principles that we want, how they might look at catchment permitting and encouraging them that this is the sort of thing that we want them to be doing. We are in this window at the moment where companies are thinking about their next business plans, for the coming review, so we will really go about saying there's a lot of wins for everybody in this. Obviously we've got to have the right checks and balances, but a number of companies are looking at it very seriously. We've proven the concept, and so it's really for companies to look at their own assets and think where this might bring most value." 'catchment load target', which when the targets are added together for the all the sites, form the target reduction which must be hit for the whole catchment. Finally, each site retains a baseline individual permit under the EPR (Environmental Permitting Regulations) at a lower level to pick up any clear environmental breaches. "A lot of the bits of kit that traditionally go in for phosphorus removal can achieve more if they are worked harder," says Hickey. "But there's always a chance that there will be a blip in performance and then it would be non-compliant. Because companies are rightly quite concerned about the risk of non-compliance, they tend to put extra interventions in place to prevent that. By regulating across the whole catchment we can allow a little more risk to be taken, because other sites can compensate for one another; but from my perspective it's important to have that backstop, if you like, so that no site goes beyond a minimal level and the environment remains protected." Overall, 11 of the sites in the programme are set for capex solutions and 13 will be given opex solutions. Nine works have been assigned stretch targets that are below 1mg/l, compared to 13 where the target is 1-1.5 mg/l and two which have targets over 1.5 mg/l. The improvements are projected to remove 47 tonnes of phosphorus annually from the catchment while being delivered at a £20M lower cost than a traditional approach. Further applications "This approach is about doing things in a different way, in order to get more environmental benefits for lower cost – that's got to be a good thing," says Wheeldon. "Technology has been the • Perspectives Matt Wheeldon, Director of Assets and Compliance, Wessex Water: "Working with the EA on this has been a very positive experience; we are all trying to achieve the same thing. The Agency are looking to move towards good ecological status for watercourses as per the Water Framework Directive, but they are also cognisant that there is a finite pot of money. This shows that we can work with them to demonstrate ways in which we can get to those outcomes in a more financially sustainable and achievable way. " Paul Hickey, Deputy Director of Water Quality, Environment Agency: "This really is a trailblazer initiative, and I think Wessex has shown a great deal of leadership in the way they've taken it forward. It was very much a partnership. We are encouraging other companies to think in the same way; I know other companies have expressed an interest, and it's the sort of thing that could feature in their asset management approaches for the coming review. It's still at quite an early stage for PR19, and I would expect more to come." The new permitting arrangements will be closely monitored by the EA