Agenda item
Issues and Challenges
The Committee will hear from Plymouth City Council officers, the Environment Agency, South West Water and Tamar Catchment.
Minutes:
Councillor Briars-Delve (Cabinet Member for Environment and Climate Change) welcomed everyone to the Committee, introduced the item and highlighted:
a)
Thanks to everyone involved in the ongoing major incident in Keyham
due to an unexploded WW2 bomb that had been discovered;
b)
The Corporate Plan included a vision for the waterfront;
c)
The waterfront was one of the cities greatest assets that supported
economic prosperity, health and wellbeing;
d)
Plymouth’s waterfront had been designated the first National
Marine Park in the UK;
e)
Supporting people to engage with the water, and public needed to be
assured of a clean environment;
f)
Wildlife within Plymouth Sound needed clean water to
thrive;
g)
Use of storm overflows were of concern;
h)
Partners had worked hard together to create a third bathing area in
Plymouth at Firestone Bay;
i)
No singular, easy or cheap fix, whilst facing the climate change
impact of increased rainfall;
j) A collaborative, creative and innovative solution was needed.
Kat Deeney (Head of Environmental Planning) introduced Plymouth City Council’s role in relation to Water Quality and highlighted:
k)
Plymouth City Council had a role in provision of signage on water
quality and short term pollution advice;
l)
Strong partnership working with organisations on nature delivery,
shell fisheries, highways and flood risk;
m)
Challenges included the sewage network, urban and agricultural
run-off, microplastics, changing weather patterns, changing culture
in relation to ‘bathing season’, behaviours, complexity
of solutions;
n) Every household could be part of the solution.
Bruce Newport (Environment Agency) introduced the Environment Agency’s role in relation to Water Quality and highlighted:
o)
All 3 of Plymouth’s bathing waters were classified as
excellent, the highest rating, without any discounting;
p)
The Environment Agency advised the Council when water quality was
going to be impacted and signs could be put up;
q)
Samples had continued through the winter at Firestone Bay to see if
winter sampling was feasible and to determine the winter water
quality, which was excellent;
r)
Discharges, treated by Plymouth City Council, into the River Plym
from Chelson Meadow landfill continued after its closure and would
for some time, but did not impact bathing waters;
s)
Devonport Dockyard discharges had been eliminated;
t)
Ammonia levels were increased due to agricultural
activity;
u)
Industrial areas were monitored;
v)
More employees across the country to increasing monitoring of water
companies;
w)
Not all storm overflows had the same impact on Plymouth
Waterfront.
Frank Newell (Environment Agency) added:
x)
Infilled creeks meant that a lot of the water drainage within the
city was underground and was difficult and expensive to
map;
y)
Integrated urban drainage modelling allowed them to understand what
improvements could be made;
z)
Expected 30% increase in peak rainfall events over next 60 years,
50% over 100 years;
aa)
Sea levels were expected to rise 1.5m over 100 years;
bb)Significant
investment was being made into water storage in parkland at
Trefusis Park;
cc)
Work in the city centre was aimed at separating surface water into
a new system, but this was an expensive solution.
Alan Burrows (South West Water) and Mark Wolsford (South West Water) introduced South West Water’s role and highlighted:
dd)Strong partnerships
in Plymouth;
ee)Strategy called
Waterfit up to 2025 and then to 2030, aimed at nurturing healthy
rivers and seas and aiming to reduce the impact on rivers by 1/3 by
2025 and to reduce operation of storm overflows;
ff)
Changes in people using the water had led to a demand from the
public expecting good water quality all year round;
gg)
Significant progress had been made in reducing pollution incidents
since 2020, with none serious incidents in 2021, and one in 2022
and none in 2023 and only 13 minor incidents since 2020;
hh)South West Water
(SWW) had installed event duration monitors on all storm overflows
ahead of the government target, and the information was available
to regulators, and members of the public;
ii)
A storm overflow action plan had been submitted to the Secretary of
State, and SWW were waiting to be able to publish this;
jj)
SWW expected to complete their plan by 2040, the only company in
England and Wales to set this target (Government’s target was
2050);
kk)126 overflows in the
Plymouth region, 54 were meeting standards at the time of the
meeting, and did not require investment;
ll)
A lot of what happened in the network could be as a result of
customer behaviour and putting items into the system that should
not be there such as wet wipes and sanitary products;
mm) Working with ECAS (Environment
Compliance Experts) looking at sewer misuse from food
establishments to stop grease, oils and fats entering into the
system;
nn)
Green and blue systems were looked at as a priority as they were
more sustainable;
oo)
Focus on storm overflows and pollution, with significant investment
from 2025-2030 as the majority of the coast was bathing water
and/or shellfish water;
pp) Plan to invest just over £3 billion from 2025-2040 in storm overflows, with £750 million funded from customer bills;
qq)There were four categories of pollution impact levels, set out by the Environment Agency (EA).
Laurence Couldrick (Tamar Catchment
Partnership) added the following:
rr)
A graphic was shown demonstrating the impact of farming on water
quality from overgrazing, growing crops close to the river, high
risk crops, inadequate infrastructure, non-separation of
pollutants, meaning they wash into the river system:
WRT_Good_Farm_Bad_Farm_Logo_small-scaled.jpg
(2560×1805);
ss)
Agriculture was one of the biggest pollutants of the rivers local
to Plymouth, impacting Water quality and resilience;
tt)
Tamar Catchment Partnership (TCP) aimed to build and promote nature
based solutions, through incentives with farmers as well as
regulation and enforcement;
uu)Soil health needed
to be achieved;
vv) TCP aimed to build resilience in communities and the catchments.
In response to questions, the following was
discussed:
ww) Data was taken from the Met
Office which predicted the future impacts of climate change on the
weather, which was used by SWW to assess the future impacts on the
sewage/water systems and the investment plan would be updated every
5 years using this data;
xx)11 named storms came
over England in 2023, when the average had been 3 or 4
previously;
yy)
Balance of affordability and size against climate change
forecasting;
zz)
Customer bills and dividends in relation to the SWW investment
plan;
aaa)
1.2 million water customers and 900,000 waste customers of
SWW;
bbb)
At the end of May 2024 a full report would be produced on Firestone
Bay by the Environment Agency;
ccc)
Real time data was available on storm overflows;
ddd)
Water Quality was commensurate with animal welfare;
eee)
Water for animals in farming;
fff)
Water net gain was a project helping farmers to create lakes and
ponds to store storm run off for their animals;
ggg)
0 days were discounted in Plymouth in 2023 for water quality, but
some days information on pollutants allowed people to decide if
they wanted to enter the water;
hhh)
Approximately only 6 or 7 poor warnings for water quality were
given in West Hoe each year;
iii)
There were four categories of pollution
that the Environmental Agency regulated water companies
on;
jjj)
Issues relating to Ernesettle Creek;
kkk)
Major developments in the Joint Local Plan had a requirement to
deliver sustainable urban drainage systems (SUDS);
lll)
The city centre developments included sustainable urban drainage
systems to separate run off from sewage;
mmm)
Misconnections from homes;
nnn)
Schedule 3 of the Flood and Water Management Act (2010) had not yet
been enacted, but the Government planned on enacting it within 12
months, which would make guidance on SUDS in new developments more
clear;
ooo)
Promotional material to make residents and companies more aware of
what couldn’t/shouldn’t be put into the drainage
system;
ppp) Educating communities of impacts of actions such as concreting over driveways.
Supporting documents:
- 240222 WQ Select Committee Cover Report FINAL, item 3a PDF 161 KB
- 240222 Water Quality - Select Committee Briefing Report FINAL, item 3a PDF 198 KB
- 240222 PCC SWW EA WQ MoU FINAL DRAFT for SC, item 3a PDF 436 KB
- PCC - Water Quality Sel Comm Presentation, item 3a PDF 7 MB
- SWW Presentation, item 3a PDF 2 MB