A water company has been accused of “wilfully polluting” while using tankers to move sewage to an overflowing pumping station in Devon.

[Effectively chucking it into the sea – Owl]

Brodie Owen www.bbc.co.uk

South West Water (SWW) said a sewer burst in Exmouth on 30 December, as well as flooding elsewhere, had forced it to use lorries to transport the waste to a nearby pumping station instead of a treatment works.

But campaigners said the pumping station was already under major pressure before waste was delivered to it.

SWW apologised for the disruption and said it was working as quickly as possible to repair the burst main.

The utility said it had been transporting waste to Maer Road pumping station, near Sandy Bay, as it had been prevented from taking it to a treatment works due to flooding.

The Environment Agency (EA) had been notified of the situation, SWW said.

But campaigners said it meant the company transported sewage to an area where sewage was already being discharged.

Geoff Crawford, from End Sewage Convoys and Pollution Exmouth, said it was “wilful pollution”.

“It’s definitely clear that they know that Maer Road is overflowing – their system WaterFit, external clearly shows that,” he said.

“Even though it’s overflowing, they are adding sewage to that overflow.”

He said the pumping station had overflowed “pretty much non-stop” since sewage tankers were used.

“There’s probably a few hundred tanker movements in the past few days, 24/7.

“They are really noisy, travelling past care homes, past schools and through residential areas.

“They are running their pumps and their engines throughout the night.

“There’s a lot of really fed-up, tired and angry residents.”

SWW said it was planning to take the waste to Maer Lane treatment works now that flooding had eased.

It said: “Our teams are working hard to repair a sewer which burst in the Exmouth area on 30 December.

“In order to complete this essential work, we have needed to use tankers to transport flows from the sewer to a local pumping station to allow the team to work on the damaged pipe.”

It said it was aiming to install an overland pipe by the end of Wednesday “to divert flows around the damaged section of sewer so we can complete a full repair without the need for tankers”

It added that it was “sorry for any inconvenience caused while we complete this work as quickly as possible”.

The EA has been contacted for comment.