{"id":80593,"date":"2026-07-31T04:08:13","date_gmt":"2026-07-31T04:08:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/news\/thames-water-boss-says-leakage-targets-not-realistic\/"},"modified":"2026-07-31T04:08:15","modified_gmt":"2026-07-31T04:08:15","slug":"thames-water-boss-says-leakage-targets-not-realistic","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/news\/thames-water-boss-says-leakage-targets-not-realistic\/","title":{"rendered":"Thames Water boss says leakage targets &#8216;not realistic&#8217;"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Water companies have performance commitments on issues such as leakage. <\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">It is illegal to release raw sewage into rivers and seas during &#8220;normal&#8221; weather conditions, but firms are allowed to do so when it rains heavily, to prevent homes being flooded.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Thames is the UK&#8217;s largest water company, supplying water and wastewater services to 16 million customers across London and parts of southern England.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Speaking to the BBC&#8217;s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/sounds\/play\/p0p1qxvg\" class=\"ssrcss-1e0jzsh-InlineLink e1kn3p7n0\">Big Boss Interview podcast<\/a>, Weston said the company treats 4.3 billion litres of waste a day, and &#8220;99.5% of the time&#8221; it gets treated successfully, although &#8220;sometimes something goes wrong&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;We want to do better when it comes to pollutions,&#8221; he said, but added, &#8220;the targets that the company is expected to make are not realistic.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;[For example], we have to hit a certain level of leakage, but it is so far in excess of what we are capable of doing, I think anyone would be capable of doing, however much money you invested, that it is not going to be achievable.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">The chance of getting to zero pollution was &#8220;very, very slim&#8221;, he added.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Ofwat told the BBC: &#8220;With around a fifth of water put into supply still lost through leakage, companies must deliver on the commitments they have been funded to achieve.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;Water company targets are intended to be ambitious and drive better outcomes for customers and the environment.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">A spokesperson for the Environment Agency said: &#8220;[We] and the public expect Thames Water to comply with the law,&#8221; adding that the agency would continue to hold companies to account where performance falls short.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">James Wallace, chief executive of campaign group River Action, said: &#8220;Thames Water&#8217;s tactics of opacity and deflection fool no-one. Telling the public to save water while this wasteful profit-obsessed corporation leaks 570 million litres of treated drinking water every day is offensive. <\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;There is nothing &#8216;realistic&#8217; about accepting sewage pollution as inevitable. The choice is simple: keep propping up a failed privatised financial model, or put Thames Water into special administration and rebuild it as a public utility serving customers, rivers and the public.&#8221;<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/news\/articles\/c04kd3gl1gpo?at_medium=RSS&#038;at_campaign=rss\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Water companies have performance commitments on issues such as leakage. It is illegal to release raw sewage into rivers and seas during &#8220;normal&#8221; weather conditions, but firms are allowed to do so when it rains heavily, to prevent homes being flooded. Thames is the UK&#8217;s largest water company, supplying water and wastewater services to 16 [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":80594,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[56],"tags":[469,21311,7266,128,1546,725],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/80593"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=80593"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/80593\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":80595,"href":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/80593\/revisions\/80595"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/80594"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=80593"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=80593"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=80593"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}