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Sewage was released into Welsh rivers, lakes and the sea for more than 800,000 hours in 2025, across more than 100,000 discharge events, according to an analysis of Welsh water company data by Surfers Against Sewage (SAS) reported by BBC Wales on 8 October 2026. That is lower than the more than 970,000 hours SAS reported for 2024. The figure is a campaigner-derived aggregate. The original SAS assessment and the companies’ full 2025 returns were not available for checking, so treat the number as SAS’s reported figure rather than an official total.
What the 2025 figure measures
The headline combines two things that are easy to run together: how long sewage was released, and how many separate releases occurred. Both come from monitoring equipment on storm overflows, the outlets on combined sewers that discharge when rainfall exceeds what the pipes can carry. The total hours figure is a sum of monitored discharge time across the year. The event count is a separate tally. Neither is a measure of pollution in the water itself.
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- Total hours: more than 800,000 hours in calendar 2025, as reported.
- Discharge events: more than 100,000, which SAS described as roughly one every five minutes.
- Geography: rivers, lakes and sea, as reported. SAS’s own breakdown by operator and by water body was not available to check.
- Source type: a campaign analysis of company data, not a regulator’s published total.
The 2024 and 2025 figures side by side
Only some of the numbers circulating about Welsh sewage releases measure the same thing. The table separates them.
| Figure | Period | Geography and scope | Source | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| More than 800,000 hours; more than 100,000 discharge events | Calendar year 2025 | Rivers, lakes and sea, as reported | SAS analysis of Welsh water company data, reported by BBC Wales on 8 October 2026 | Campaigner aggregate; original assessment not checked |
| More than 970,000 hours | Calendar year 2024 | Rivers, lakes and sea, as reported | SAS analysis, reported by BBC Wales on 8 October 2026 | Campaigner aggregate; same method not independently confirmed |
| 777,545 hours; 94,974 discharges | 2025 | Welsh rivers only | A member’s statement in the Welsh Parliament plenary debate of 24 June 2026 | Parliamentary statement, not a dataset; narrower geographic scope than the headline |
The 2025 and 2024 totals are the only pair that matches in name. They do not come from a single published dataset, so the year-on-year drop should be read as SAS’s reported change rather than a measured one. The parliamentary figures are useful as a cross-check on scale, but they cover rivers only and cannot be added to or subtracted from the headline.
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The reporting attributes part of the decline to drier summer weather, since rain drives overflow use. Natural Resources Wales (NRW), the regulator, points instead to its tighter monitoring and to company investment. Neither explanation has been established as the cause, and the two are not mutually exclusive.
How a storm overflow spill is recorded
Most of the time a storm overflow does nothing. NRW explains that many Welsh sewers carry household and business wastewater and rainwater in the same pipe. When heavy or prolonged rain overwhelms that capacity, the overflow releases the excess to a river or the sea instead of letting sewage back up into homes and streets. Wales has more than 2,000 permitted storm overflows. Each permit sets the conditions under which discharge is allowed, such as heavy rainfall, and some require screening.
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Wet-weather spills
These are the discharges the system is designed to make. An overflow that operates during heavy rain and within its permit conditions is not, by itself, a breach. Event and Duration Monitors (EDMs) record when each overflow operates and for how long. NRW says these monitors were installed at storm overflows by March 2020.
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Discharges can also happen without rain, typically after a blockage. NRW says it may take enforcement action where a discharge contravenes a permit. A monitored spill is therefore a recorded event, not automatically an illegal one, and an EDM count does not by itself say how much harm a release caused.
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Why year-to-year totals are hard to compare
Several factors change the totals independently of how the sewerage system performs. NRW’s 2024 reporting flags the following:
- Monitor coverage: 279 monitors operated for less than 90% of the year, so some hours or events were not captured.
- Revised returns: Dŵr Cymru Welsh Water resubmitted its 2024 return after NRW found discrepancies. NRW accepted the resubmission after review.
- Changing asset lists: permit changes that combined storm activities with other discharge types altered the number of listed overflows, so the denominator is not constant.
- Data completeness: NRW has said data completeness and accuracy need to improve.
Any year-on-year comparison of total hours should account for these shifts before being read as a measure of infrastructure performance.
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Operator-level figures from NRW
NRW publishes company-level figures that are more granular than the national headline, but they cover a different scope. The table below uses Dŵr Cymru’s storm overflow spill data for 2022 to 2024. The average spill count and average duration are per overflow with data, and the duration is per monitored spill event. They are not total hours.
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| Measure (Dŵr Cymru) | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Listed storm overflows | 1,946 | Not stated in NRW’s 2024 spill data report | 2,064 |
| Average spills per overflow with data | 40.9 | 55.3 | 48.9 |
| Average duration per monitored spill event (hours) | 7.1 | 8.6 | 8.2 |
NRW’s annual environmental report for 2024 lists 2,070 permitted Dŵr Cymru storm overflows, so the overflow count differs slightly between NRW’s two 2024 publications. The same report notes three overflows recorded above 5,000 spill hours and 19 with no duration data. Those three overflows should not be treated as typical. They show how much variation sits behind an average.
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Pollution incidents are a separate measure
Storm overflow spills are not the same as pollution incidents, which are confirmed events where a sewerage asset causes harm or breaches conditions. NRW recorded 132 sewerage-asset pollution incidents for Dŵr Cymru in 2024. The company self-reported 74% of those incidents, against NRW’s target of 80%. NRW’s enforcement announcement of 18 July 2025 quoted Nadia De Longhi, its Head of Regulation and Permitting: “We’ve seen a huge deterioration in the performance of Dŵr Cymru Welsh Water since 2020, and despite repeated warnings and interventions they’ve been unable to reverse this concerning trend.”
A headline about hours of spills and a headline about pollution incidents can both be accurate and still point in different directions. Using one to describe the other overstates what either shows.
If you see an overflow operating in dry weather
- Report it to NRW’s incident hotline on 0300 065 3000, or use its online reporting form.
- Put wet wipes, sanitary products and cotton buds in a bin, not the toilet or sink.
- Do not pour fats, oils or grease down sinks. NRW says blockages from these can cause spills.
What the headline can and cannot tell you
The 2025 figure is a credible signal that discharge activity remained very high across Wales, and it is consistent with NRW’s own description of a weak performance record at the largest operator. It is not an official 2025 total, and it does not show how many releases were lawful, how much harm they caused, or how one operator compares with another in the same year. Those answers need the original SAS assessment, the 2025 company returns and NRW’s published 2025 data, none of which were available to check when this article was written.
Verify the BBC Wales report and the SAS analysis directly before quoting them. The copy used here was a web report that was not hosted on a recognised BBC domain.
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