CNN
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It was at the end of 2021 that James Richardson heard about England’s poop problem.
“I saw tweets talking about the scale of the problem, and the numbers were so huge that I thought it couldn’t possibly be true that so much sewage was being dumped,” he said. I’ll tell you now.
“I thought, ‘This is social media, someone must be exaggerating it.’ It would be a scandal if it were true, so I thought I’d look into it.”
His research echoes his tweets that raw sewage is being pumped into England’s rivers and coasts at a truly alarming rate. So-called “storm overflows” are designed to flush full drains into rivers, the sea or even the coast, and, as the name suggests, are meant to be used in exceptional circumstances. Masu. But in his 2021, when Richardson reviewed the data, they pumped out a total of 2.7 million hours of content nationwide, or more than 300 years’ worth of content.
In recent years, the British public has noticed beaches being closed during busy summer weekends, dead fish floating in busy rivers, and people surfing in waves filled with waste water. I’ve seen it.
“At first it was the smell,” says Giles Bristow, who once found himself in the middle of sewage mud while surfing in Staunton, Devon.
“Then I saw toilet paper and sanitary products in the water. It was a real ‘oh my god’ moment.”
In recent years, Britain’s “poo-filled beaches” problem has sparked growing anger among people across the United States.
of Annual swim race canceled It is also causing concern on the Thames just before the current bank holiday weekend. The race, which has been held since the 1890s, was scheduled to take place in July, but was canceled due to concerns about sewage entering the water body.
Beaches in Brighton and Hove, a popular seaside getaway for Londoners, were closed for the August bank holiday in 2022, the weekend when Brits flock to the beach. “Brighton and Hove seems to be flooded over and over again,” said Hugo Tagholm, former chief executive of campaign group Surfers Against Sewage (now replaced by Mr Bristow). He says this. he told CNN at the time..
This weekend is also a public holiday. However, while Brighton and Hove beaches are safe for swimming, many other beaches around the UK are not. According to Surfers Against Sewage’s live tracker, 12 of the 14 storm water overflow sites on the Isle of Wight, a popular resort off the south coast, are currently draining sewage. Devon, a popular holiday spot, also has a number of overflows currently open. These range from those near towns such as Salcombe and Dawlish to those in Sandy Bay, which has achieved Blue Flag status in the past for its pristine waters.
Despite widespread public outcry, the situation is worsening.Richardson’s graph on his website, aptly named top of the poops – focuses on England – showed a slight downward trend from 2020 to 2022, but rose sharply in 2023.
Sewage spills increased by 54% last year, according to Data released in March Environment Agency – set up by a British government-established public body set up to ‘protect and improve’ the environment.
Back in 2021, Richardson, a software developer, was so horrified by what he saw that he started a website to share the data in an accessible way. Right down to the names, everyone was a direct reflection of the TV show they grew up on, “Top of the Pops.” ”
Anyone who wants to know how runoff is happening in their area can search the data by water company, coast, river, shellfish area, and – bad news for politicians – by constituency.
“People can see what’s going on in their local area, and it really shows the serious problems we have,” Richardson says. “These numbers are too hard to keep in mind, but the situation is not getting any better.
rear Riots in 2022 The situation has worsened, with Britain’s chief medical officer labeling it a “growing public health problem” and the head of the Environment Agency calling for the CEOs of the offending water companies to be jailed.
annual “Event period monitoringA report on storm flooding in the UK published by EDM in March said sewage spills had increased by 54% in 2023. The annual average number of spills per overflow increased from 23 to 33 in 2022. This equates to more than one case every two weeks. The total number of leaks increased from 301,091 to 464,056.
To make matters worse, in 2023 sewage spilled into UK territorial waters for twice as many hours as in 2022, or 3.6 million hours, or the equivalent of more than 400 years.
“Well-behaved” overflow has also been reduced. Companies that had fewer than 10 breaches per year decreased from 48% in 2022 to 40% in 2023. Also, the number of companies that had no leaks at all decreased from his 18% to 13.9%. Such overflows due to “exceptional” circumstances have become commonplace.
A brief judgment from the Environment Agency? “There simply isn’t enough.”
“This is a complete scandal,” says Giles Bristow, CEO of the marine conservation charity. Surfers against sewage. “Things have gotten much worse. It’s shocking.”
Surfer against sewage report The study found that 1,924 people became ill after entering British waters between October 2022 and September 2023, triple the number reported the previous year.A political party called the Liberal Democratic Party is conducting election activities. Victims should be compensated by the water company.
Bristow attributes this to “significant underinvestment by private water companies that have not met their obligations.” UK water services were privatized in 1989.
Ms Richardson is particularly upset because her provider, Thames Water, split her bill into two payments. “One is for fresh water and he has one for sewage treatment, which is about half the bill,” he says. “So it’s shocking to know that they’re essentially fly-tipping this thing.”
In 2021, Thames Water was fined £4 million (just under $5 million) for an incident in 2016 when it spilled an estimated amount of water. 500,000 liters of untreated sewage About 3,000 fish died in the river near Richardson’s home. The judge who imposed the fine called it “disgraceful”.
By November 2023, the company will have at least Pour 72 billion liters of sewage into the Thames, England’s longest river since 2020. Thames Water did not respond to a request for comment from CNN. The water company previously said it was working on infrastructure improvements to prevent future discharges.
“It’s like paying a recycling fee to have something taken away, only to find out it’s just being thrown into the ocean,” Richardson said.
“We pay a lot of money for water in the UK. We’re not asking them to make our rivers better, just don’t throw things into them.”
Of course, underwater sewage is nothing new, and it’s not just a UK problem.
For example, in 2018, then-Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte shut down Boracay Island in the Philippines for almost six months, calling it a “cesspool.”
The United States is no stranger to sewage spills. One closed the beaches of Long Beach, California in 2022 and again in April 2023.
BRISTOW – He is still willing to go into the sea but advises surfers to check for sewage Real-time pollution tracking app Before doing so, he calls water pollution a “global problem.” But he also says that many other countries are better at handling and monitoring wastewater. In France, for example, the public has daily access to up-to-date information on water quality in their area.
“The UK has consistently ranked at the bottom of the European table.” [for water cleanliness]” he says.
In 2020 (the last year the UK joined the EU), the country Lowest quality bathing water in Europe, only 17.2% of UK beaches are rated ‘excellent’. Compare this to Cyprus, where all beaches were ranked excellent, or Greece, where 97.1% were ranked excellent.
Please also compare 2022 dataHere, the UK is not included in the statistics as it is no longer part of the EU, but the lowest rated country is Poland, with 55.9% of its beaches rated as excellent in terms of water quality.
It’s not just the beach.according to 2019 dataJust 14% of England’s rivers and lakes were classified as having ‘good ecological status’.
In 2012, the European Commission took the UK to the European Court of Justice for violating wastewater regulations.
“No one wants children to ingest human faeces,” Chris Whitty, then Britain’s chief medical officer, wrote in a 2022 report.
“It is vital that we are not reclassified as ‘Europe’s dirty men'” Hugo Tagholm told CNN That same summer.
So how can we improve the situation?
The drainage system in the UK state of Victoria is often criticized for its inability to handle 21st century levels of sewage. In addition to pressure, rainwater runoff passes through the same pipes as wastewater from homes and offices. Combined with increasingly extreme weather conditions thanks to the climate crisis, drains could overflow.
However, this still does not fully explain the situation in the UK. Research from the Royal Society of Chemistry says stormwater overflows should only be used when sewers are out of service. 6 times the normal amount. Still, data from the UK Japan Meteorological Agency It shows that 2021 and 2022 were actually drier than average, and 2023 was only 11% wetter than average.
Mr Bristow wants “smarter” weatherproofing solutions for the UK’s likely wetter climate.
In fact, forget about just widening the pipe. He wants to prevent rain from reaching the drains. He suggests efforts to replant forests to protect against heavy rains and introduce wetlands, saying they provide a “natural defense”.
None of this can happen quickly. Surfers Against Sewage is campaigning to eliminate seawater and high-priority discharges into the natural environment by 2030. Mr Bristow said he was in talks with all major political parties ahead of Britain’s next general election. A general election must be held before then. January 28, 2025.
Meanwhile, in 2023, the government Installing monitors on storm floods across Englandat least allow data to be collected.
In the government’s “Storm Runoff Reduction Plan,” Published in 2022has set a goal for water companies to “reduce the impact of storm flooding” by 2050.
“It will take time to turn the tank around, but the tide is turning,” Bristow says. “If we make the right investment decisions now, we should expect things to turn around by 2030. The time to act is now or never.”
That sounds like six more years of poop-filled beaches, but Mr Bristow is adamant people shouldn’t put off a trip to the UK’s coastline because of sewage issues.
“We have some of the most beautiful beaches in the world and a hospitable community,” he says. “Come surf, enjoy the beach and rest. But download [Surfers Against Sewage] Look at the app and know where to go. ”
