Ed Acteson of SOS Whitstable, who tracked the data, said from his experience the scale was equivalent to five months’ worth of waste: “The Environment Act is supposed to herald a new era for the environment in Britain. But this is the worst sewage pollution I’ve ever seen in the southeast.” Stormwater overflow monitoring by Southern Water this month reveals the scale of releases into coastal bathing waters. The beach at Pagham, west of Bognor Regis, which boasted an ‘excellent’ water quality rating this summer, has seen raw sewage discharged for more than 179 hours in two separate and continuous releases, according to figures released by the company. On the Isle of Wight, Cowes has seen sewage released for more than 80 hours, Ryde more than 128 hours and Sandown beach, which the tourist board says is one of the best on the island, has had more than 65 hours of sewage and raw sewage discharges. In total, in the first eight days of November, the company has discharged sewage on beaches for more than 3,700 hours, in 493 discharges. At some point in the last 48 hours, 78 beaches with swimming waters showed sewage discharges on the company’s map. Throughout 2021, Southern discharged raw sewage into waterways for more than 160,000 hours, with the average spill lasting 8.4 hours, according to Environment Agency figures. Swimming waters, which are rated from poor to excellent in the summer months, are not monitored by the Environment Agency outside the designated swimming season from May to the end of September, so the impact of the scale of such discharges this month is not measured. Acteson said: “There are 86 beaches with swimming waters and as of yesterday 78 of them had sewage discharges and a further five had discharges which the company says are not affecting. This is environmental vandalism and most of these dumpings are still going on as we speak. It fills us with foreboding for the coming winter months.” Southern Water recently changed its Beachbuoy pollution alert map for the public, reducing the number of automatic red alerts after a discharge. The company filters releases to decide if they have an impact or not, with releases listed as impacted highlighted in red on Beachbuoy’s map. Southern says it takes into account factors such as tides and the length of the sewage outfall, with outfalls 5km (3 miles) out to sea described as unaffected. November data analyzed by SOS Whitstable shows Southern Water has listed a raw sewage discharge at Bexhill lasting more than 120 hours as ‘non-impacting’. Nick Mill, head of Southern Water’s clean rivers and seas task force, said stormy weather and significant levels of rainfall last week had resulted in high volumes of surface water, which could have overwhelmed the network. Archie Bland and Nimo Omer take you to the top stories and what they mean, free every weekday morning Privacy Notice: Newsletters may contain information about charities, online advertising and content sponsored by external parties. For more information, see our Privacy Policy. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and Google’s Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. “To protect homes, schools and businesses from flooding, storm surges act as a release price to relieve pressure – allowing excess flows to bypass treatment and enter rivers and the sea,” he said. “These discharges are highly diluted, typically 95% rainwater, and permitted by the Environment Agency. However, we know these are not acceptable and that is why we are working hard to reduce them across our region.” He added that the task force is leading the industry in finding solutions and that, while improvements continue, the company will provide information through the Beachbuoy service in order to be “as open and transparent as possible about any impacts on coastal swimming waters and waterways recreation”.
