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Water company fined for polluting Devon river

South West Water was ordered to pay £28,000 in fines and costs for discharging poorly treated sewage effluent in the River Yeo near Crediton, on the 6th of June.

P The case brought by the Environment Agency on June 19, 2010 when a member of the public alerted the Agency to pollution on the River Yeo near Crediton sewage treatment works.

An Agency officer saw sewage effluent gushing from a treatment works outfall into the main river causing gross pollution of the River Yeo. A sample of the effluent was tested and found to exceed permitted limits for ammonia and biochemical oxygen demand (BOD).

On June 21, 2010 another Environment Agency officer visited the River Yeo. The illegal discharge from the treatment works had stopped, but the riverbed was covered with a carpet of sewage fungus from bank to bank. There were dead fish in the river including 38 bullheads, 5 stone loach and a young salmon/sea trout.

Sewage fungus was visible in the river for a distance of some 700 metres downstream of the outfall. An ecological survey revealed that riverlife had been severely affected by the pollution.

An investigation by the Agency showed that the treatment process at the Crediton works started to go wrong in April 2010. South West Water carried out maintenance to repair it, but should have been aware when the plant, that was operating at reduced capacity, developed further problems. These first became apparent on June 7, causing pollution of the watercourse.

Unable to treat all of the sewage arriving at Crediton, South West Water tankered it away by road to its works Countess Weir, Exeter at a cost of up to £14,000 a day. At its peak, 14 tankers were continuously travelling between the two sites from June 19, 2010 until the treatment works was fully operational again on July 1, 2010.

‘One of the fundamental principles of self monitoring is for site operators to report any issues or problems to the Environment Agency. Despite ongoing difficulties with its treatment process and a deterioration in effluent quality, South West Water failed to notify us of the problems it was experiencing at a site that serves as the main treatment works for Crediton,’ said Mischka Hewins for the Environment Agency.

‘South West Water was fully aware that the River Yeo is a sensitive watercourse, yet no checks were made on the condition of the river while poor quality effluent was being discharged from the treatment works. The number of fish killed was probably higher as we only counted dead fish visible in shallow water. In all likelihood, more fish casualties would have been out of view in deeper water,’ said Mischka Hewins.

South West Water was today fined a total of £20,000 and ordered to pay £8,000 costs by Exeter magistrates after pleading guilty to two offences under the Environmental Permitting Regulations 2010 including discharging noxious or polluting matter into inland freshwater and operating a sewage treatment works while in breach of its site permit.

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The pureshowers team

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