BLOG: Water Quality - How We're Working Hard to Protect the Environment

Scottish Water’s Director of Environment Planning & Assurance, Simon Parsons, explains how the publicly owned utility is working hard to protect the environment and keep its customers informed when it comes to overflow spills: 

The public in Scotland (and elsewhere) have been able to track sewer overflows in Scotland since December 2024. 

Just click here Overflow Map - Scottish Water. 

Later this year we’ll go even further. We’ll also include information on bathing waters and rainfall. 

Being open and transparent, we also share our data through a public Application Programme Interface (API) that allows anyone to access and reuse the data in an application. 

And when we developed these transparent tools, we worked with campaigners - as you’d expect from a publicly-owned water company. 

Hopefully everyone can agree it is also important that the discussion about water quality in Scotland is based on facts. 

What do storm overflows do?  

Overflows are designed to protect our homes and businesses from sewer flooding during heavy rain, and when they do operate, the waste water is heavily diluted with less than 1% coming from toilets. 

The impact of climate change 

We cannot escape the fact that with climate change comes more extreme weather and we must take on the challenge to deal with its consequences head on. 

That is why we continue to invest record amounts in our sewer network, but we are also investing in alternate solutions using the natural environment or so-called blue green infrastructure. 

Helping people make informed choices 

While the data we publish online and SEPA’s advice to avoid swimming for up to two days after heavy rain already helps people make informed decisions, it is also important to remember that our sewer network is not the only potential source of bacteria in the environment. 

Others include run-off from land – agricultural, cattle, sheep etc – wildlife such as gulls and seals – and dogs where owners don’t pick up after their pets, so it would be inaccurate to claim illness is caused solely by overflow activity. 

Scotland’s overall water quality 

Scientists at the independent regulator SEPA have rated 87% of Scotland’s water environment as being “good or better”, one of the highest ratings in Europe. 

The testing process measures water samples and is not in any way related to the number or location of event duration monitors we have installed on our sewer network, so is entirely independent and a reliable indicator of overall water quality. 

Where Scottish Water is investing 

As a publicly-owned business all our profits are reinvested into our water and waste water services.  

Through our Improving Urban Waters Investment Programme, we have allocated an additional £500m to further increase monitoring and reporting, and deliver targeted infrastructure projects to significantly reduce sewer-related debris and spills. 

Our commitment

We are monitoring more overflows than ever before, providing more information on overflows than ever before and investing more than ever before in our waste water network.   

We are proud that Scotland’s water quality is at its highest ever and we remain committed to targeting resources and investment to preserve and protect Scotland’s water environment. 

Myth Busting facts