23 Oct 2024
Defra has announced the launch of an Independent Commission into the water sector and its regulation, in what is expected to form the largest review of the industry since privatisation. The Commission forms the next stage in the Government’s long-term approach to ensuring we have a sufficiently robust and stable regulatory framework to attract the […]
16 Oct 2024
The privatised English water system has been singled out for criticism by the UN special rapporteur on the human right to clean water. Photo by Nick Vasin Prof Pedro Arrojo-Agudo said water systems should be managed as a publicly owned service, rather than run by private companies set up to benefit shareholders. The […]
25 Sep 2024
The government has accepted that not enough progress has been made in improving the water environment in England. The admission came in response to the Office for Environmental Protection’s (OEP) report on the implementation of the Water Framework Directive regulations and River Basin Management Planning. Defra’s response recognises that “The government agrees that there has […]
26 Jun 2024
An investigation by Unearthed has revealed that England’s beleaguered environmental regulator has been turning up late – or not at all – to three out of every four of the country’s worst pollution incidents. Between January 2017 and October 2023, the Environment Agency (EA) missed its own response time targets for more than 3,400 serious […]
19 Jun 2024
Having created a watchdog for the environment, the government took its teeth out and muzzled it. Can public outrage rouse the Environment Agency to action? Useful article from The Guardian, highlighting how government has gradually weakened and undermined the environmental regulator for England., including subsuming its independent website into Defra’s.
13 Mar 2024
The Sustainable Solutions for Water and Nature (SSWAN) partnership has published an outline of a new model and discussion paper for regulation of the water environment. The new SSWAN model shifts regulation towards catchment-based approaches to support cheaper, more innovative, more collaborative projects that more accurately reflect local priorities. SSWAN proposes a four-tier regulatory framework: […]
06 Mar 2024
The Drinking Water Inspectorate has published new research on dual pipe recycling systems to understand the associated risks and to assess the suitability of English and Welsh regulations to manage the risks from evolving systems. The research project found that many large-scale dual pipe systems in the UK have either been mothballed or have never […]
03 Jan 2024
Reported in the Los Angeles Times California is set to adopt regulations that will allow for sewage to be extensively treated, transformed into pure drinking water and delivered directly to people’s taps. The regulations are expected to be approved Tuesday (19 December) by the State Water Resources Control Board, enabling water suppliers to begin building […]
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