Water Weekly 2.0 Vol 21

A weekly round-up of all the latest news in the water industry.

Your go-to weekly newsletter on all things water.

THREE LEADING WATER COMPANIES FACING BACKLASH FOR THEIR LACK OF SEWAGE CONTROL

Throughout the last week or so, controversy has arisen regarding water businesses and sewage leaks. Water firms are set to be punished for several years of sewage spills; Thames Water, Yorkshire Water, and Northumbrian Water face ￡168m fine by the industry regulator following an investigation by Ofwat.

The proposal is part of Ofwat’s largest ever investigation into water company performance and comes following growing ‘public anger’ over the environmental and financial performance of certain water companies!

Last year, sewage spills into England rivers and seas doubled, and this encouraged concern and forced industry regulators to act. According to the Environment Agency, there were 3.6 million hours of spills in 2023 compared to just 1.75 million throughout the previous year. This works out a shocking number of 1,271 leaks per day across England last year.

Following, Ofwat and the Environment Agency were set to conduct separate investigations into England’s nine sewage companies, despite these two agencies themselves under the investigation by the independent Office for Environmental Protection.

Therefore, Ofwat’s investigation has looked into whether the three companies Thames Water , Yorkshire Water , and NWG (Northumbrian Water Group) have been providing customers with the level of service they are entitled to under the law. Last week, it was revealed the three companies had failed to carry out appropriate investment and maintain their networks, leading to repeated releases of raw sewage into the country’s waterways.

Out of the ￡168m fine, Thames water received the largest punishment of ￡104m.

The regulators chief executive, David Black said:

“Ofwat has uncovered a catalogue of failure by Thames Water, Yorkshire Water and Northumbrian Water in how they ran their sewage works and this resulted in excessive spills.”

“The level of penalties we intent to impose signals both the severity of the failings and our determination to take action and ensure water companies do more to deliver cleaner rivers and seas.”

“Looking to the future, we want to transform companies’ performance under our new price control that starts in April next year, so we reduce spills from sewage overflows by 44% by 2030 compared to 2021 levels.”

However, the threat of fresh fines will raise questions about how much companies can afford to invest in infrastructure upgrades.

The recent spills throughout England certainly encourages water bills across the country to rise, yet at the same time, water companies can spend money on these three areas to reduce sewage spills:

• Increasing the capacity of sewage systems
• Separating out rainwater and wastewater
• Installing natural systems such as planting trees which absorb the water.

PFAS CONTROVERSY – Navigating the reoccurring challenge in the UK Water Industry

The known ‘forever’ chemicals PFAS are always a major topic within topic within the water industry, and existing water treatment methods are unable to remove PFAS completely. Moreover, most methods used by the leading water specialists are extremely complex and costly.

According to a recent article, so far, the U.S leads in PFAS remediation efforts for drinking water and wastewater, with thirteen out of fifty states having adopted or proposed maximum concentration levels or enforceable limits on contaminants in water. An additional thirteen states have implemented other methods of regulation, including response levels, health advisories and action levels; ultimately generating a steading flow of site mapping and cost calculation reports with high figures running through billions of dollars.

Bluefield Research forecasts drinking water utilities will spend nearly 13.5 billion dollars up until 2030 on PFAS retrofits – primarily dedicated to the installation of granular activated carbon filtration. The growing scale and complexity of water and wastewater treatment requirements will usher in more innovative solutions of treatment throughout our industry.

In addition, the wastewater and biosolids side of the industry poses greater challenges as PFAS permeate multiple segments of the sludge management value chain. Considered a lower public health priority than drinking water, the scant data on PFAS in biosolids indicates equally alarming cost implications for remediation.

Despite a continuous battle for the water sector in tackling the growing PFAS, the public health cost of inaction far outweighs the investments required by the water sector.

Fantastic companies such as Puraffinity and Aclarity continue to strive to meet environmental needs and social responsibilities that come with the water sector. Their technologies novel advanced materials to remove many harmful pollutants such as PFAS from water and wastewater.

Off the back of advancing treatments, solutions, technologies, and innovation, Aquastill BV has acquired a new technology.

As a leader in modular membrane distillation technology, Aquastill has recently announced the acquisition of SolarSpring Membrane Solutions assets in the field of Membrane Distillation.

SolarSpring’s team will support the transition and stay connected as advisors help Aquastill to bring Membrane Distillation to the next level of technology readiness.

The acquisition underlines the commitment of Aquastill to the further development of Membrane Distillation as a Sustainable Thermal Desalination technology for both sea water and industrial wastewater.

TETRA TECH appoints new board member!

The leading provider of high-end consulting and engineering services in water, environment and sustainable infrastructure; Tetra Tech , announced this week that John M Douglas will join the Board as of September 30th.

Douglas brings over 40 years’ experience in operations, leadership, strategy, and project management at public companies providing technology-enabled consulting services across a range of sectors.

Thankyou for reading!

Please reach out if you work within the industry - The water team at JH would love to hear about YOUR work and YOUR experience within the water sector!

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