Northern Ireland is facing massive fines after a European court criticised its poor sewage treatment system. The European Court of Justice found inadequate treatment at nine waste waterworks, including those at Bangor, Portrush, Londonderry and Omagh. The original complaint was made by Friends of the Earth, and Northern Ireland director John Woods said, "We could see the raw sewage being pumped out, but it seemed nothing was being done about it. This appalling pollution is not acceptable to us, it's not acceptable to the people of Northern Ireland and it's not acceptable to the European Court."
The Department of the Environment for Northern Ireland (DoE NI) said they were still studying the ruling, and their view was that it did not call into question the handling of the planning applications in the affected areas. The level of the fine is expected to be known in the next two months.
The problem lies in that much of the current sewerage system is over 100 years old and is now unable to cope with the volume of waste generated by the population of Northern Ireland today. Untreated and poorly treated sewage is routinely dumped in loughs and rivers, and massive investment and reform is needed to bring our water and sewerage infrastructure up to the required standards. At the centre of this reform is the Water and Sewerage Services (Northern Ireland) Order SI 2006/3336, which has now been published and will transfer responsibility for delivering water and sewerage services from the Water Service to a Government owned company, known as Northern Ireland Water Ltd, from 1 April 2007.
