Beef abattoir fined £28,000 for effluent breaches
A beef, pork and lamb abattoir was fined nearly £28,000 today after admitting breaching trade effluent limits.
Chitty Food Group Ltd, which owns Chitty Abattoir, in Guildford, Surrey, admitted ten counts of breaching trade effluent concentration limits and one of failing to install and maintain equipment, a meter to measure effluent discharges.
Guildford magistrates imposed fines of £2,500 for each of the effluent breaches with a further £2,680 penalty for the remaining offence.
Legal costs of £1,242 and investigation fees of £4,384 were also awarded to Thames Water, who brought the prosecution under the Water Industry Act 1991 after tests found that the abattoir, between July 2007 and April 2008, had put more than the permitted levels of certain substances down its drains.
Levels of ammoniacal nitrogen, a compound found in urine, were found on one occasion to be up to nine times higher than they should have been.
Settleable solids, including bone particles, hooves, gristle, were recorded up to more than fives times the allowed limit, while fat and oil from the carcasses were seven times the permitted levels on one occasion.
Chemical Oxygen Demand (COD) - the amount of oxygen Thames Water had to pump into water during the subsequent treatment of the effluent - was 20 per cent higher than it should have been, the court heard.
Thames Water Trade Effluent Manager Tony McHattie said after the case:
"We take breaches like this very seriously. They put our sewage treatment works under incredible strain and could result in environmental damage.
"This case should serve as a warning to other companies that we will not hesitate to take action if you're disposing illegal levels of waste into our sewerage network.
"We are keen to work with firms to help them meet their legal requirements but we are prepared to take the matter to court if they disregard these obligations and do not co-operate."
