Sewage plant not designed to cope with city's waste - study

Designers of Dublin’s main sewage treatment plant severely underestimated daily waste levels being pumped into the facility, it emerged today.

A report has found the multi-million euro facility in Ringsend has been frequently working above its capacity of 1.64 million people since it opened five years ago.

The study showed the flow of sewage to the wastewater treatment plant was underestimated by 225,000 people, while odour levels were 20 times higher than the standard required in an environmental impact assessment.

Consultant Brendan Fehily revealed while the population projections by planners were correct – up to 1.98 million people by 2020 – loads from commercial premises like shops, restaurants and pubs were miscalculated.

“The cumulative additional load from commuters, tourism and the commercial sector could amount to 225,300 people,” said Ms Fehily.

“This does not take into account any additional loads from persons unaccounted for in the Census or from a possible increase in affluence in Dublin leading to a higher per capita load from domestic sources.

“Taking all these factors into account, the present overloading of the works does not seem improbable.”

Environment Minister John Gormley, a local Green Party TD, commissioned the study when he won his ministerial seat last June.

He raised serious concerns over strong smells from the facility, which takes waste from across the Dublin region, and queried why it was already operating above design capacity.

“We need to know how the problems arose in order to prevent similar instances in other projects in the future,” said the minister.

Ms Fehily found while planners had made allowance for 20,000 commuters in the city each day, the actual figure was 90,000 – an equivalent population rise of 23,300 people a day – and the number of tourists equalled 12,000 citizens.

It also emerged effluent discharges from commercial premises were never included – adding an extra 190,000 people a day.

Elsewhere, the report highlighted that odour levels allowed under the operational contract were 20 times the standard required in the environmental impact assessment.

Ms Fehily said remedial work to deal with the odour should be complete by the end of this month.

Local opposition politicians demanded that the upgrade works are implemented immediately.

Fine Gael Deputy Lucinda Creighton called on Mr Gormley to ensure those responsible for the plant fiasco are held responsible.

“Heads need to roll over this,” she said.

“The people of Ringsend, Irishtown and Sandymount have endured this stench for years, and so far nobody has stood up and accepted responsibility for the plant’s failure.”

The report, which listed a series of recommendations to include the upgrading of the works and monitoring of discharge from all licensed and commercial premises and between local authorities, will be referred to the Joint Oireachtas Committee on the Environment and council.