National awards for sewage works

A SUSTAINABILITY project at one of Wessex Water’s sewage treatment works has won two national awards. 

The Somerton reedbed project, which aims to sustainably remove nutrients from watercourses has won a Green Business Award for Green Technology and a gold Green Apple Environmental Award for Innovation.

The initiative, which started in 2010, uses reedbeds to extract phosphorous by generating reactions between wastewater, metal-rich materials and reeds in an attempt to find an alternative and sustainable way to remove phosphorus from treated sewage effluent.

Ruth Barden (pictured), head of environment and conservation at Wessex Water, said: "We are really pleased to have won these innovation awards for this project and for it to be nationally recognised.

"We are very excited about this project and what it has revealed about the use of reedbeds as a much more sustainable alternative for phosphorus removal."

It stems from national and European legislation, implemented by the Water Framework Directive in 2000, as excessive levels of phosphorus in watercourses cause an imbalance in the natural ecosystem.

Currently, in order to meet strict legal requirements, Wessex Water removes phosphorus from wastewater using a traditional process which involves costly chemicals transported from Eastern Europe and South America.  The treated effluent is then returned to rivers.

But by creating a modified reedbed with a different substrate, which is capable of reacting with the phosphorus, Wessex Water can remove phosphorus without the use of additional chemicals or energy. This is a sustainable solution which helps to protect river water quality and aquatic life.

The Somerton reedbed project (above).

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