Persistent untreated waste water impacts our fisheries resource: Inland Fisheries Ireland
Inland Fisheries Ireland (IFI) welcomes the EPA’s report on Urban Waste Water Treatment in 2019. IFI has had ongoing concerns relating to raw sewage discharges from treatment plants and continues to take prosecutions where these impact on fisheries.
Dr Greg Forde, Head of Operations at Inland Fisheries Ireland said: “Continuing untreated discharges to waters around Ireland pose an unacceptable risk to the environment and public health. These untreated discharges are preventing the recovery of the biodiversity and ecology of significant rivers, estuaries and also where discharges go direct to the sea. It is unacceptable that many rivers are failing to recover due to persistent untreated discharges or overflow discharges where the capacity of treatment plants is inadequate to address growing populations.
IFI is also concerned that the programme to address the lack of facilities in the 35 areas without proper treatment of effluent will see only one of these completed in the current year and only a further one in 2021. It is not until 2022 that a significant number of these plants will come online.”
Inland Fisheries Ireland recently launched updated guidelines ‘Planning for Watercourses in the Urban Environment’ which outlines an integrated watercourse protection strategy, which if implemented properly can significantly improve the quality of life for people living in urban areas.
