Shareholder investment in the top ten privatised UK water and sewage companies has decreased by £5.5bn since privatisation. while dividend payments have increased to £72.8bn according to a new analysis by the University of Greenwich.
I love #trains ! & I love #InterRail !! These are impressions from today’s trip to #ripe88 : tea ceremony in the Dutch train, German clouds (with #music notation electricity lines! ), #Polish brunch with additional Indonesian snacks, while reading a book about Native #American language: collectivist culture & animism grammer ! (There is no word for please: food is meant to be shared )
Brixham, a Devon harbour town, has been struck by an illness caused by a microscopic parasite - cryptosporidium - in the water!
About 16,000 households and businesses in the Brixham area have been told by South West Water (SWW) not to use their tap water for drinking without boiling and cooling it first.
Not an expert but it does strike me as symptomatic of the state of our water companies and water system. #Water#Sewage#ukpolitics
'When they initially studied this process, [Patricia] Stathatou and [Christos] Athanasiou found that yeast can effectively and rapidly remove trace lead — at challenging initial concentrations below one part per million — from drinking water. Conventional water treatment methods either fail to eliminate lead at these low levels or result in high financial and environmental costs to do so.'
"Britain’s debt-laden water utilities are being encouraged by the regulator Ofwat to set up new privately financed companies to deliver billions of pounds worth of critical infrastructure such as reservoirs, treatment works and pipelines, which will be paid for through customer bills"
Outrageous. Nationalise them without compensation and abolish Ofwat, which is totally compromised.
Having learnt nothing from the previous disasters around PFI projects in the health service, OFWAT is pushing the model for getting investment in water infrastructure restarted....
So, the model to shift us from being exploited by renter firms who have taken our money & used it pay dividends rather than maintain the system, is to replicate that model in special purpose vehicles, running infrastructure projects on contract...
It will not go well, as history has already shown!
“Across the country, private companies are swooping in to buy local water and sewer systems from the governments that own them. Then they jack up the prices -- forcing normal people to pay higher rates not just for the water that comes out of their faucets, but even the water that comes out of their toilets.
South West Water said: “We are working with public health partners to urgently investigate the source. We apologise for the inconvenience caused and will continue to keep customers and businesses updated.”
The town of Catacocha, located in the south of Ecuador, is in a province known for being almost a desert: dry forest, barren soil and rains that only appear two months in the year.
A historian discovered the water collection system long ago used by Palta Indigenous people and persuaded locals in Catacocha to apply it.
'For years this has been described by water companies and politicians as a problem of “Victorian” sewers.' 'In fact, modern sewers are the problem. Very little of the British sewer system – less than 1 per cent, in some areas – is Victorian, and it is not the Victorian sections that are responsible for the most spills.'
'The £78bn that has been distributed to shareholders since privatisation has been extracted entirely from the public. The £96bn the industry says is needed to fix the system by 2030 will also come from the public.'
Simplicity of two white water lilies in black and white. I captured these beauties in the wetlands of Florida. In the Spring they bloom wild all over Florida covering the waterways where the water is still and relatively shallow.
The simplicity of black and white puts the focus on the fine details of the white petals.
This is the river Rhine in cologne. It's the biggest and longest river in Germany.
The drought shows us structures and things that are usually under the water.