Revealed: the ‘black box’ wastewater trade that rakes in millions for UK utility companies

Firms made more than £340m last year from processing industrial and commercial wastewater at sewage works that are unable to remove many chemical pollutants

Water companies in the UK made more than £340m in revenue last year by pouring billions of litres of industrial and commercial wastewater into sewage treatment works that experts say are not designed to remove most chemicals, leaving pollutants to pass into rivers, seas and farmland.

Water companies are required by law to take industrial wastewater and issue permits called “trade-effluent consents” that allow businesses to send it to sewage works, though water companies can refuse applications.

However, no independent regulator oversees the trade-effluent process and there is no central register, so Watershed Investigations, the Guardian and the campaign group River Action compiled a database of 26,000 consents, providing the first ever national picture of the system.

Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2026/oct/09/uk-water-companies-industrial-commercial-wastewater-sewage-treatment

Water companies warned of problems years before supply outages

South East Water was warned of supply problems years before the taps ran dry, Watershed revealed. Regulators repeatedly told the company it did not have enough water to meet demand in two areas that lost supplies.

It was among many water companies that were warned by Defra, Ofwat and the Environment Agency about supplies and leakage. Watershed secured coverage in The Times, on ITV News and LBC, and on Yahoo News and local media.

The Guardian Editorial: the UK can’t ignore the risks from PFAS

The Guardian’s editorial on ‘forever chemicals’, for the first time explicitly states the papers views on the issue, saying UK politicians must not ignore this pollution problem, nor allow business as usual.

Click on the link below to read the full article.

Watershed PFAS investigation generates two academic papers

Watershed’s work exposing PFAS pollution in the river Wyre has generated two important academic papers from scientists at Stockholm University and Manchester Metropolitan University. This is the third academic paper Watershed’s work has helped underpin, see the Forever Pollution Project for the third.

Watershed shortlisted for British Journalism Award

Watershed is a finalist for a British Journalism Award. The Watershed Pollution Map and the stories it has helped generate have been shortlisted for a prize in the environment category alongside BBC News, BBC Spotlight, The Bureau of Investigative Journalists, The Guardian, Belfast Telegraph and SourceMaterial.

Watershed leads Cambridge University’s Data Lab on water pollution

During a two-day workshop in June, investigative journalists Rachel Salvidge and Leana Hosea and CDH researcher Anne Alexander led a multidisciplinary team of early career researchers in a collaborative effort to analyse satellite images and other publicly available data sets. The focus was on identifying the impact of intensive farming practices on water bodies across the United Kingdom.

New Watershed Ocean Pulitzer Fellow

Watershed is absolutely delighted to have support from the Pulitzer Center. Congratulations to Saroj Pathirana, our new Ocean Pulitzer Fellow who will be investigating global shipping pollution. Watch this space for more news. 

 

PM’s constituency in top 10 of water pollution ranking, investigation finds

Rishi Sunak is running for a constituency that has ranked in the top 10 for potential water pollution, reports The Independent, using Watershed’s Pollution Map.

Richmond and Northallerton – a new constituency in North Yorkshire following boundary changes – ranked ninth in data analysis by investigative journalism platform Watershed.

Mr Sunak was previously MP in the old Richmond (Yorkshire) constituency, which has now been split mostly into Richmond and Northallerton, with some of the original area going to Thirsk and Malton.

CLICK HERE TO LAUNCH THE POLLUTION MAP

‘Dirty secret’: insiders say UK water firms knowingly break sewage laws

Whistleblowers say UK water companies are knowingly failing to treat legally required amounts of sewage, and that some treatment works are manipulating wastewater systems to divert raw sewage away from the works and into rivers and seas.

It is well known that water companies are dumping large volumes of raw sewage into rivers and seas from storm overflows but an investigation by the Guardian and Watershed Investigations reveals that the industry’s “dirty secret” is bigger, broader and deeply systemic.

By law, every wastewater treatment works must treat a minimum amount of sewage as stipulated in their environmental permits. Four whistleblowers have told Watershed that a large proportion regularly fail to do so and are not reporting it to the environmental regulator.