The Environment Agency has awarded Severn Trent the highest possible rating for its environmental performance despite having just fined the water company £2m for a potentially “catastrophic” discharge.
Severn Trent, one of the UK’s largest water firms, supplies water to 8m people across Gloucestershire, Herefordshire, and Nottinghamshire. In a water industry first, the agency earned its 4-star status for a fifth consecutive year.
But the achievement’s legitimacy will be met with widespread scepticism after the Environment Agency successfully prosecuted Severn Trent in February for ‘recklessly’ releasing over 10 Olympic-sized swimming pools’ worth of raw sewage in a major illegal spill between 2019 and 2020.
The judge overseeing the case described the risk to the environment and human health from the spill, which resulted from the firm not having a sufficient number of the parts it used to prevent surcharges, as “enormous.”
The Environment Agency gave the firm a 4-star rating in both 2019 and 2020 when the discharge occurred during the new year.
Severn Trent’s latest award also comes just a week after Ofwat, the industry’s other regulator, opened an enforcement case into it and three other water companies. The decision was the result of what it described as a “detailed” analysis of the firm’s environmental performance and data on its spills from storm overflows.
Elsewhere in the Environment Agency’s report, the quango said that 90 per cent of “serious pollution” incidents came just were caused by just four water companies – Anglian Water, Southern Water, Thames Water and Yorkshire Water. The regulator’s Chair, Alan Lovell, described the situation as “unacceptable”.
The four agencies called out in the report and South West Water were all given the lowest 2 star rating.
Northumbrian Water and Wessex Water were awarded 3 stars.
Liv Garfield, Severn Trent’s CEO, said of her firm retaining its 4 star status: “Our customers want to know that we’re getting it right when it comes to caring for the environment, and this recognition again reflects that promise and commitment.
“While we welcome the tougher measures year on year to drive continued improvements, there’s always more to be done, and we’re doing it.”
The Environment Agency’s Lovell said: “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.”