Water companies routinely discharging sewage from emergency overflows

By Robert Windscheffel Data obtained by Channel 4 News shows water companies across the country are routinely using emergency overflows to discharge sewage into rivers and seas – something campaigners believe is illegal. We know about sewage being released from combined sewer overflows – this programme has been reporting on it for years – but as well as those, there are over 6,000 emergency overflows in England and Wales. Currently only around quarter are monitored, but new legislation will look to increase that over the next decade.

There's strict criteria when they can be used and unlike storm overflows, that doesn't include periods of heavy rain. As the name suggests, they can only be used in an emergency. A recent document from the water regulator Ofwat on the use of emergency overflows stated: "Factors which are strongly indicative of a breach include where there was more than one discharge from an emergency overflow per year.



" This programme submitted EIR requests, similar to a freedom of information...

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