Southern Water appeared at Chichester Crown Court yesterday for sentencing following one charge from the Environment Agency of breaching its environmental permits.
The company was fined £160,000 at the hearing, plus £27,000 costs.
The charge relates to an incident on September 1, 2012, when technical problems at the company’s East Worthing Wastewater Treatment Works resulted in an emergency release of untreated wastewater to sea.
Phil Barker, Director of Operations said: “We apologise to any customers or businesses who were affected by the incident at our East Worthing waste water treatment works back in 2012.”
“This is a significant fine but we have already invested over a hundred times that amount over the past three years to improve the site and install back-up systems to help reduce the risk of a future emergency."
“We are disappointed with the verdict but we have a responsibility to our customers and we took the tough decision to make a controlled release of untreated wastewater into the sea to protect homes and the hospital from flooding.”
Craig Nienaber, Business Development Manager for Safe Access Solutions (SAS) at HUBER Technology, explores why the company is seeing a growing level of interest in its safe access solutions for critical infrastructure providers, including their application in wastewater treatment assets.
Albion Water, the first NAV (New Appointment & Variation) to have been established in1999 and now under the ownership of SDS Water Group, has appointed Andy Holland as its new Director of Business Development.
UK water companies are invited to join an upcoming webinar which will explore how the sector can take indirect potable reuse (IPR) from concept to full-scale operational reality.
James Sumsion, CEO of predictive water intelligence specialists Kohtari, says the water sector needs to take a giant leap forward, so that it can anticipate and act upon water quality issues - rather than merely react.
Hear how Scottish Water has completed its £235 million Ayrshire Glasgow Resilience Project - customers across Greater Glasgow, Ayrshire and East Renfrewshire will now benefit from a more secure and resilient water supply.
Hear how United Utilities is accelerating its investment to reduce spills from storm overflows across the Northwest.
Find out more about the remarkable career opportunities on offer at WSP - scroll down to watch the inspirational video.