Sewage spills rose to a record high last year, according to data from the Environment Agency released today.
Sewage was dumped in our rivers 464,000 times over 4 million hours were in 2023, representing a 54% increase on 2022.
The Environmental Agency blamed the increase partly on the increased amount of rainfall in the year because 2023 was named by the Met Office as the 6th wettest year since its records began in 1836.
However, they added, it is important to note that heavy rainfall does not affect water companies’ responsibility to manage storm overflows in line with legal requirements.
Minister Andrew Griffith says there’s a positive in that figure, because it shows ‘were detecting this at a much higher rate than we were before’
Campaigner Feargal Sharkey wrote on X
“So there we have it. Over the last 5 years WCs have spent 13,618,860 hours, on 1,833,919 occasions dumping sewage into our rivers.WCs blame the rain, the regulators, customers and each other.Govt has lost control of the water industry and WCs couldn’t have a flying hoot”
