The Environment Agency has today (23 July 2024) published
its annual report on the environmental performance of England's
nine water and sewerage companies during 2023.
The report shows an improvement in star ratings under the
Environmental Performance Assessment (EPA), but the majority of
companies continue to underperform.
The EPA is the only independent comparison of environmental
performance across the sector. Since 2011, the Environment Agency
has used the EPA to rate each company in England from 1 star to 4
stars.
The aim of the report is to highlight where improvement in water
company performance is required and push for continuous
improvement across the sector. As the regulator the Environment
Agency constantly tighten EPA targets. This has been fundamental
in driving better performance, however current performance
remains well below expectations.
This year, five water companies are rated as requiring
improvement (2 stars), one company is rated as good (3 stars) and
three companies achieved 4 stars.
- Severn Trent Water – 4 stars, the same as the previous year
- United Utilities – 4 stars, up from 3 stars
- Wessex Water – 4 stars, up from 2 stars
- Northumbrian Water – 3 stars, the same as the previous year
- Anglian Water – 2 stars, the same as the previous year
- Southern Water – 2 stars, the same as the previous year
- South West Water – 2 stars, the same as the previous year
- Thames Water – 2 stars, the same as the previous year
- Yorkshire Water –2 stars, down from 3 stars
In response to the report findings, the Environment Agency has
set out further plans to transform its regulation of the water
industry.
Environment Agency Chair Alan Lovell said:
“For the nation to have cleaner rivers and seas, water companies
must take responsibility to understand the root cause of their
problems.
“It is promising to see some companies starting to accept their
responsibilities, but it is evident that the pace of improvement
continues to fall short.
“We frequently tighten standards to drive better performance and
we have been clear that we expect all companies to achieve, and
most critically sustain, better environmental performance.
“As part of this we are taking forward our biggest ever
transformation in the way we regulate, recruiting up to 500
additional staff, increasing compliance checks and quadrupling
the number of water company inspections by March next
year. Through additional resources, tightened EPA metrics
and new legal powers, we will be playing our part to ensure the
industry steps up on the environment.”
This year's report also found that:
- The number of serious pollution incidents increased from 44
in 2022 to 47 in 2023, remaining unacceptably high despite
expectation to trend towards zero. Over 90% of these were caused
by four companies (Anglian Water, Southern Water, Thames Water
and Yorkshire Water), resulting in a polarised performance
picture across the sector.
- Total pollution incidents from sewerage and water supply
assets increased to 2,174 – the second consecutive annual
increase and highest number recorded since 2019.
- Compliance with numeric permit conditions for discharging
treated wastewater is not improving, with 45 sites found to be
non-compliant.
The results make clear that companies need to go further and
faster to improve their environmental performance.
The Environment Agency is challenging how things have been done
in the past to address water industry performance through
increasing its capacity and improving capability. Having secured
an additional £55m of funding from government and water company
permits, the Environment Agency are investing in a bigger
specialised enforcement workforce and setting aside £15 million
for new digital and monitoring systems to identify the root cause
of issues.
In addition, the number of water company inspections will be
quadrupled by the end of March 2025 to 4,000 and increased to
10,000 inspections the following year. The evidence gathered
through these inspections will inform future performance
assessments, investment plans and proactive enforcement.
Since 2015 the Environment Agency has secured 63 prosecutions
against water companies, securing fines of over £151 million. In
2023 the Environment Agency concluded 4 prosecutions against 4
different water companies, with fines of more than £6.7
million.
The full report is available to read on gov.uk
ENDSNotes to editors
- Since 2011 the EPA and wider reporting have provided an
independent and objective comparison of water and sewerage
companies' performance. The EA constantly tighten EPA targets to
improve standards. If for example, we had applied 2023 targets
since 2011, the number of stars would have risen from 11 to 25
over that period. Whilst this shows some improvement over that
time, current performance is still a long way from meeting our
expectations. Later this year, we will further review the EPA to
strengthen and broaden the metrics from 2026.
