Anglian wastewater enforcement package under consultation

Ofwat is consulting on a £62.8m enforcement package proposed by Anglian Water to remedy failures in managing its wastewater treatment works and network.

This will be paid by the company and its shareholders, not by customers. £57m will be used to tackle complex problems in eight catchment areas and £5.8m to establish a new community fund to offer grants to improve the environment.

The scale of the redress package is related to Anglian’s turnover. It is higher than Ofwat would have imposed as a penalty, had Anglian not taken a constructive approach to the action (£57.1m, 6.5% of Anglian Water’s annual turnover). Moreover, the enforcement approach enables the money to be spent on local improvement work rather than it going to Treasury under the penalty approach.

Ofwat’s investigation found that Anglian Water failed to operate, maintain and upgrade its wastewater assets adequately to ensure they could cope with the flows of wastewater. Ofwat said the company failed to have in place adequate processes and oversight by its senior management and board to ensure its assets were performing adequately and that it was meeting the legal requirements expected of it.

Anglian, at its recent Capital Markets Day, pledged commitment to improve its wastewater performance by: deploying thousands of sensors to monitor its wastewater assets more effectively; accelerating storm overflow reduction with new storage; and disconnecting unregulated wastewater discharges – all of which will help to alleviate hydraulic overload.

The announcement marks the fifth case in Ofwat’s industry-wide wastewater investigation. It follows the conclusion of cases against Yorkshire Water, Thames Water and Northumbrian Water, and Ofwat’s recent consultation on a £24m enforcement package for South West Water.

• Anglian has reported reaching a major delivery milestone in the development of its strategic pipeline, after completing the southern stretch of pipe-laying. 127km of interconnecting pipe has now been installed between Bexwell and Colchester, forming a critical part of the wider network that will stretch from North Lincolnshire to Essex. The grid will enable up to 55m litres of water to be moved from wetter to drier parts of the Anglian region. The company said it is the largest drinking water project the UK has seen for a generation.