Every day, 7.5m litres of sewage are poured into Irish waters — sixteen years after EU deadline 

Enough sewage to fill three Olympic-sized swimming pools — some 7.5m litres — is pumped into Ireland's rivers and seas, according to the Environmental Protection Agency. Stock picture

Enough sewage to fill three Olympic-sized swimming pools — some 7.5m litres — is pouring into Irish seas and rivers every day, 16 years after EU deadlines passed to meet treatment standards.

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has said that only half of Ireland’s sewage meets European standards to protect the environment when 90% is the average across the bloc.

“Over the years, Irish Water produced various plans and time frames to eliminate discharges of raw sewage,” the report states.

“However, Irish Water often changed these plans and extended its own time frames to complete this work, thereby prolonging the risks to the environment and public health.”

More than a billion litres of sewage is collected in sewers every day to be treated at more than 1,000 plants. The country’s main treatment plant at Ringsend in Dublin is overloaded and fails to consistently treat sewage to the required standards, the Environmental Protection Agency said, while 32 towns and villages are still discharging raw sewage into the environment every day.

There are 38 areas where wastewater is impacting rivers, lakes, estuaries, and coastal waters, but utility firm Irish Water has no clear action plan or timeframe to improve treatment at 27 of these, the EPA said.

The European Court of Justice issued a judgment in 2019 that six towns and cities must upgrade their sewer systems, the report found. It will cost over €500m for these six sewer systems alone.

Despite the myriad problems with the current state of play, it will cost billions of euro to fix, the EPA warned.

“It will take many years and a multibillion-euro investment to get all treatment systems up to standard,” the agency stated. “As all the problems cannot be dealt with in the short term, the available resources must be directed where they are most needed and will bring the greatest benefits.”

EPA programme manager Noel Byrne said that, 16 years after the final deadline to comply, half of Ireland’s sewage is still not treated to the standard needed to protect the environment.

Tom Ryan, a director of the EPA said that while the elimination of raw sewage discharges from Cobh and Castletownbere in Cork are good examples of progress, substantial investment would be needed over two decades to overhaul the creaking infrastructure.

Towns such as Clonakilty and Kinsale passed standards in 2020, before falling back into failure last year, the report showed.

Biodiversity is also in the firing line because of the failures, the EPA report said.

“The EPA identified 12 towns and villages where treatment must improve to protect endangered freshwater pearl mussels. Irish Water has repeatedly failed to provide a clear time frame to carry out improvements at five of these areas.

“In addition, Irish Water must complete overdue assessments of the impacts of wastewater discharges on shellfish waters and put plans in place to resolve any risks identified.”

In response, Irish Water said that, since 2014, when it assumed responsibility for public water services, 60% of raw sewage discharges by volume have been eliminated.

This has been through targeted investment in sewerage infrastructure where none existed previously.

“We are on target to eliminate nearly all of the remainder by 2025,” said Irish Water.

“This has been achieved by building new wastewater plants and networks in 21 towns across the country where treatment had never existed before.

“This new infrastructure has stopped the discharge of about 20m litres of raw sewage every day, which equates to the sewage generated by over 100,000 people.”

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