The Irish Environmental Protection Agency is warning that a “substantial and sustained increase” in investment is required for wastewater treatment if pollution and health risks are to be avoided.
The EPA report on Urban Waste Water Treatment in 2015, released today, shows that a “substantial and sustained increase” in investment in public waste water treatment infrastructure is needed to eliminate discharges of raw sewage, comply with European Union treatment standards and protect the environment and public health from the adverse effects of waste water discharges.
Reported annual investment in infrastructure since 2014 has dropped by 40% from the average levels during the previous decade. The average rate of capital investment between 2014 and 2015 was €166 million per annum, which is approximately 40% lower than the average annual investment between 2000 and 2011. This lower rate of investment is not sufficient to address the outstanding infrastructure deficiencies, the EPA says.
The report says that 142 large towns and cities complied with the mandatory EU waste water treatment standards during 2015. However, 29 have failed and raw sewage is still discharging from 43 areas. While new treatment plants have been built at Ardmore, Dunmore East and Ballylongford to eliminate raw sewage discharges, the planned delivery of treatment plants at half of these areas has now been delayed by an average of almost two years.
In response to EPA enforcement activities Irish Water has provided a timeframe for the provision of infrastructure to eliminate the discharge of untreated waste water from 40 of the 43 areas. The EPA is requiring Irish Water to complete its assessment of the options to address the remaining 3 areas and to provide plans setting out how and when they will be connected to waste water treatment plants.
The counties of Cork, Donegal, Clare and Galway account for 32 (or 74%) of the areas discharging untreated waste water.
The report demonstrates that Ireland is not spending enough, and not spending quickly enough to deal with the problem. Commenting on the report Mr Gerard O’Leary, Director of the EPA’s Office of Environmental Enforcement said,
“The pace of resolving waste water treatment needs to improve. It is not acceptable that the timeframe to eliminate the discharge of raw sewage from over 20 areas has slipped by almost 2 years. We need to see increased capital investment and improved efficiencies in the delivery of the outstanding infrastructure necessary to protect our rivers, lakes and coastal waters and for a more sustainable quality of life.”
The EPA has identified the following priorities and is calling for resources to be targeted at resolving the issues:
- 29 large towns and cities fail to meet mandatory EU waste water treatment standards. The final EU deadline for the provision of such treatment was 2005.
- 43 areas are still discharging raw sewage.
- 13 collection networks require significant upgrades to meet EU standards and prevent the loss of waste water into the environment.
- Waste water discharges contributed to poor quality water at 6 popular beaches including Merrion Strand, Youghal Front Strand and Duncannon.
- Waste water from 45 areas was linked with river pollution, down from 49 in 2013.
- 16 waste water schemes require improvements to protect the critically endangered freshwater pearl mussel.
Other key findings from the report include:
- Just 25% of waste water discharged into nutrient sensitive areas from large towns and cities complied with nutrient quality standards, compared to the EU average of 88%.
- 1 in 5 long term incidents were attributed to operation and maintenance issues.
- EPA audits identified 29 sites with no operation and maintenance programme. This is a key tool to ensure the correct operation of treatment infrastructure.
- The discharge of raw sewage from Ardmore, Dunmore East and Ballylongford ceased in 2015 and these areas are now served by modern treatment plants.
David Flynn, Programme Manager of the EPA’s Office of Environmental Enforcement commented:
“EPA analysis has found that better operational practices should resolve issues at one fifth of poorly-performing plants. Irish Water needs to improve the performance of these plants to get the most from the existing infrastructure.”
Click here to download the report in full
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