Yorkshire Water and their capital partners Ward and Burke and Van Oord, a marine specialist engineering company, have commenced work on their replacement long sea outfall for their Withernsea Wastewater Treatment Works which is located off Holmpton Road near Hollym.
The work is part of a £26 million scheme to move the existing wastewater treatment works further inland due to coastal erosion. The present site is now only 40 metres from the sea but when it was last upgraded in 1991, it was 168 metres away from the cliff edge.
Work will involve directionally drilling from this location out to sea - from this point the marine section of pipe will be handled by a number of vessels, sunk into place, and finally connected up.
The pipes, which have been manufactured in Norway, will be transported to a facility in Grimsby where they will then be taken up the coast when required. This will help reduce the number of vehicle movements to the area.
An overland pipe will be laid in fields around Hollym to the location of the planned new wastewater treatment works next to the A1033 south of the village. This same route will be utilised to extend the existing sewage main up to the location of the new treatment works.
The work on the 3km long sea outfall is expected to take until October this year when it will begin taking flows from the existing wastewater treatment works allowing the old long sea outfall to be removed including the rock bags that have been protecting it due to being exposed by coastal erosion.
A contractor is currently being appointed to build the new, more environmentally sustainable Aero-Fac wastewater treatment works.
The plant would be the first plant of its kind in Yorkshire, with a low-carbon construction producing minimal odour and noise. It would have no need for sludge removal, meaning no tanker movement and the impact on traffic this brings. The facility will service wastewater for 15,000 people.
Once completed the old works will be decommissioned and removed and returned to agricultural use.
With the UK government demanding a 50% reduction in storm overflow spills by 2029, the era of reactive management is over. Speaking in the House of Commons on 21 July 2025, then environment secretary Steve Reed said, “This Government will cut water companies’ sewage pollution in half by the end of the decade.”
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