Groundwater Risk Assessment: Treated Effluent Discharges to Infiltration Systems

Under the draft Environmental Permitting (England and Wales) Regulations 2010, discharges of treated effluent to infiltration systems will require an environmental permit.

In order to support a permit application, an environmental risk assessment may be required.  The Environment Agency has published cross sector guidance (ie. guidance appropriate across all the sectors in EP) and sector specific guidance to assist operators with applying and maintaining environmental permits.

Guidance on undertaking Environmental Risk Assessments for Environmental Permits is given in the H1 Environmental Risk Assessment document.  Part 1 of this guidance relates to general guidance and Part 2 relates to sector specific guidance.  Within Part 2, there are three documents:

Although these documents detail different sectors, the general approach to undertaking environmental risk assessment is common. If an effluent discharge is greater than 15 m³d or is a trade discharge, then a quantitative risk assessment will be required to support a permit application.

ESI has a long track record in undertaking groundwater risk assessments to support environmental permitting across a range of sectors.  Our approach is fully compliant with the current Environment Agency guidance and is based on best practise.  Risk assessments undertaken by ESI range from the very simple, such as a simple soakaway for a domestic dwelling, through to complex risk assessments for landfill sites.

We have extensive experience of undertaking infiltration system risk assessments for a number of utility companies including United Utilities, Thames Water Utilities, Southern Water and Wessex Water Services.

For further information, please call ESI to find out more about Treated Effluent Discharges to Infiltration Systems.