'Sick of this sh*t': Protest at Ballyronan Marina against sewage discharge

A protest was held at Ballyronan Marina to raise awareness of sewage pollution in the North's waters.

The demonstration at the marina, which sits on Lough Neagh, was one of many held across the UK organised by Surfers Against Sewage on May 20.

The Lough was chosen because around 200,000 tonnes of raw sewage is discharged into its catchment area annually despite it being the source of drinking water for 750,000 people.

Surfers Against Sewage representative for the North, Declan McMenamin, said the North faces serious obstacles in its fight for clean water.

“What we're trying to do here is raise awareness within Northern Ireland about the issues we have here – and we have a lot of issues,” he said.

“We don't have a functioning government at the minute and the issue is partly down to funding. NI water will say 'well it's up to the DFI to provide the infrastructure' and the DFI will say 'well we don't have the budget'.

“But this is a health issue. Since Covid more and more people have taken to inland water swimming, sea swimming. There's been a huge change in how people interact with the ocean but if it's not safe to take your kids there or it's not safe to swim there then we need to highlight that.”

It was recently reported that a nine-month-old dog named Harley reportedly died after drinking water from Lough Neagh. Two other dogs, Winnie and Milo, reportedly died last year after interacting with the lake.

The Antrim and Newtownabbey Council carried out an investigation into the water following the deaths last year and concluded it was of ‘excellent’ quality.

A postmortem of one of the dogs found ’nothing microscopically observed to explain the unexpected death of the dog’.

It then removed precautionary advice against bathing in the lough.

Surfers Against Sewage wants to see bathing spots protected from discharges and a 90% reduction in sewage discharges by 2030.

The group helped highlight the massive profits made by water companies last year despite the regular polluting discharges.

The chief executives of Yorkshire Water and Thames Water and the owner of South West Water even declined to accept bonuses this year following sustained pressure.

The group is hoping to launch some new ways to keep people safe from polluted water in the near future.

“We've developed our own app – called the 'Safer Seas and River Service App' – that gives realtime sewage alerts. We have been working with Daera and AFBI to get it up and running for the bathing season this year.

“We're also trying to set up something so people can report to us if they feel sick after being in the water and then we can be reactive and test the water quality at that time because at the minute the testing period is only from 1 June to 15 September and more and more people are using the water all year round,” Declan said.

Across the North, seven million tonnes of raw sewage are discharged into its waters a year.

NI water was found to be responsible for 591 polluting discharges between 2017 and 2021 but was fined just nine times.A representative of NI Water said it needed more investment to solve the issue.

“There has been significant underinvestment in NI Water for a prolonged period and this has affected the performance of the wastewater assets across the whole of Northern Ireland.

“NI Water has been investing significantly in sewer network and environmental modelling, as well as instrumentation technologies to establish the regulatory status of CSO discharges across Northern Ireland. The status is determined by the Northern Ireland Environment Agency.

“Spills, when they do occur to the environment, happen when sewers are at or exceeding their design capacity due to heavy rainfall, i.e., storm conditions, when large volumes of stormwater run-off are entering the combined sewer system. Overflows then operate in wet weather and there are spills into waterways, which prevent the flooding of homes, businesses, and schools, which would present public health hazards. These highly diluted flows spill into the environment where they are even further diluted in receiving watercourses.”

They said the issue could take nearly two decades to fix.

“Within the Price Control period (2012/22 – 2026/27), NI Water has prioritised [around] £300 million to address unsatisfactory intermittent discharges from its sewer network which includes the Lough Neagh drainage catchment. This investment was agreed with the Independent Utility Regulator and key stakeholders which includes the Northern Ireland Environment Agency.

“NI Water will invest £2.2 billion during the PC21 period (2021/22 to 2026/27), with over £1bn being invested in wastewater assets. However, the full scale of the wastewater capacity issues across Northern Ireland will realistically take at least 12 - 18 years, or two to three Price Control periods, to address.

“It is therefore critical that the PC21 business plan is fully funded, and all future investments will depend on the provision of funding to NI Water by the NI Executive.”