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Exeter property owner pays for ‘poor quality’ sewage from housing

A Somerset company was ordered on the 4th August to pay £3,000 in fines and costs for discharging poor quality effluent from a private sewage treatment plant at Dunchideock near Exeter. The case was brought by the Environment Agency.

Magistrates heard there had been a long history of problems at the Sidelong Close Treatment Works, Dunchideock that culminated in the owners, A & H Gadd Limited being prosecuted by the Agency in June 2007.

The problems date from 1999 when the treatment plant was installed to serve a new housing development of 23 properties and included a serious pollution incident in 2006 and repeated breaches in the site’s discharge consent. The works discharges into a tributary of the River Kenn.

The day to day management of the treatment plant is undertaken by Gadd Homes Ltd, a subsidiary of A & H Gadd Ltd with technical advice and maintenance provided by Tekserve*, a Hampshire-based company.

Under the terms of its consent, effluent from the works must not exceed limits of 40 mg/ litre for biological oxygen demand (BOD) and 60 mg/ litre suspended solids.

In January 2007 A & H Gadd were served with an enforcement notice for breaches in its discharge consent despite earlier assurances from their technical advisers, Tekserve* that the treatment works shouldn’t have any difficulty with compliance.

Following earlier problems the Agency started monitoring the site closely. Officers noticed the treatment works was ‘extremely erratic’ in its performance. Samples taken between January 25 – November 29, 2007 revealed another seven breaches in consent.

‘The site operator was fully aware of the poor performance of this treatment plant, yet still have not found a solution. Had the pollution continued unchecked there would have been a deterioration in the quality of the receiving watercourse which in turn would have impacted on fish and invertebrate life,’ said Richard Tugwell for the Environment Agency.

A & H Gadd Limited of Ash House, Bindon Road, Taunton, was fined £2,000 and ordered to pay £1,000 costs by Exeter magistrates after pleading guilty, at an earlier hearing, to four counts of contravening a condition of its Consent to Discharge at the Sidling Close Sewage Treatment Plant, Dunchideock, an offence under Section 85(6) of the Water Resources Act 1991.