A Startling Discovery
These two pictures taken from the same location eight years apart show how the condition of river Windrush deteriorated over that time. Two photos just eight years apart. The first showing clear water, with healthy weed swaying in the current, and ducks feeding from it. The second an unhealthy looking grey, and no life. The Environment Agency were not doing anything about it and had no plan.
So we started our own investigation.
The Results Were Truly Shocking.
Illegal and legalised pollution. A toxic cocktail hidden from public view.
We knew that Thames Water had a horrible history of fines for serious sewage pollution. We discovered they were being allowed to pump untreated sewage into the River Windrush and that the Environment Agency permitted it in ''heavy rainfall''. As we dug deeper, the picture got worse. The protection we thought we had from EU anti pollution legislation was being watered down or ignored. In fact there was not even any requirement to know when raw sewage was being released, let alone alert river users!
Poor connections in the sewage network mean that rainwater wrongly enters the system and when the works cannot cope with the volume they store the excess mixed sewage in a tank and when that fills they send it into the river. At some works there are no tanks and the overflow goes straight into a watercourse or on to land.
The picture on the left is of the end of the Bourton on the Water overflow pipe when it wasn't flowing. This pipe discharges onto 'treatment' land where it runs over the land area into a ditch, and then into the river. The condoms and sanitary towels seen in the ditch in a Cotswold field were a shocking sight in 21st century Britain. Is this the best we deserve?
A recent World Wildlife Fund investigation found that such overflows are commonly used to dump sewage that can't be treated as a way to save money. This is happening all over England and Wales. It is cost cutting at the expense of our environment. Whilst this has been going on, the water industry has made huge profits with only cursory attempts to remedy the faults in the system.
We were truly alarmed and baffled to discover that not only does the Environment Agency (directed by Government) allow this pollution, the water companies have been allowed to avoid installing simple mechanisms to indicate when they dump sewage so how can they tell when they must report a pollution incident? You couldn't make this up! So of course they don't have to measure how much they have dumped on us! Increases in population and the increasing use of chemical additives has changed the nature of sewage and the system can't cope. To subscribe to our FREE mailing list please click on the link below.
Investigation and Research
After taking some technical advice to understand the history and decline we made requests for information under the Environmental Information Regulations and Freedom of Information Act.
We soon discovered that Thames Water had alarms on some of their untreated sewage ‘storm’ tanks although they could only tell us when the tanks were filling, not when they were actually emptying! Hard then to tell how they can fulfill their obligation to report to the Environment Agency when they discharge raw sewage, when there is no heavy rainfall excuse.
We were told there had been 50 activations on the River Windrush on the works where there was an alarm, in a two year period. At Bourton-on-the-Water (serving 6548 people’s waste) the overflow sewage goes straight onto a field there, near to a stream which feeds the Windrush.
This has been recognised as a way for Water Companies to hide illegal pollution for years. Why then have successive governments allowed the water companies to avoid installing alarms and concealing the risks to the public? In 2012 an Environment Minister finally asked the companies to address this recording at most works by 2020. Not to stop it. just record it! Profit before our environment again.
See our blog and ten things page for some of our discoveries.
To view our YouTube video channel ‘Windrush Wasp’, including our BBC Countryfile appearance, BBC South Today and questions in parliament, CLICK HERE.
Did you know that only 2 in 10 of the rivers in England and Wales are classed as in a reasonably healthy state? See our ’10 things’ page for more information.
