Anglian Water goes wild with 26 new treatment wetlands

Anglian Water plans to create 26 new treatment wetlands across the East of England, as part of its Get River Positive pledge.

The company will invest £50m between now and the end of the decade in the wetlands programme, with the first three wetlands near Charsfield, Cotton (both in Suffolk), and Stagsden (Bedfordshire) to get underway early in 2023. The remaining 23 are in the final stages of feasibility work to identify the most suitable locations available to benefit the environment.

The ambition is to improve resilience without stacking up carbon emissions and chemical usage. The projects will be modelled on Anglian Water’s flagship River Ingol wetland which it launched in 2019. The site, near Ingoldisthorpe, in Norfolk – the first of its kind in England – was created in partnership with the Norfolk Rivers Trust. The wetland has since operated as a natural treatment plant for millions of litres of water, as well becoming a beautiful habitat and a flourishing haven for wildlife.

Director of quality and the environment for Anglian Water, Dr Robin Price, said: "This is a hugely ambitious programme, the scale of which has never before been delivered by a water company in the UK. Our wetland programme at Ingoldisthorpe has provided a blueprint which we can now roll out across the region. Nature-based solutions are a key part of our vision for the future: not only providing vital services to our customers and meeting the demands of our ever growing population, but doing so in a way that benefits, wildlife, the environment and local communities too.”

Chief executive of the Rivers Trust, Mark Lloyd, said: “This very welcome focus on nature-based solutions provides so many more benefits for society than traditional water treatment processes, which only have one output. The Rivers Trust movement looks forward to working in partnership with Anglian Water to help make these ambitious plans a reality.”