Soil: Contamination
(asked on 19th June 2025) - View Source
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what assessment he has made of the potential impact of land-spreading sewage sludge on soil contamination.
Answered by
Emma Hardy
Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
The Sludge (Use in Agriculture) Regulations 1989 (SUiAR) supported by the Sewage Sludge Code of Practice provide environmental and health protections from sludge spreading.
The Government is continuing to work with the Environment Agency to assess the regulatory framework for spreading sludge. We recognise that effective and proportionate regulations are an essential tool to improve the environment.
The Government has been working with water companies under their Chemical Investigations Programme (CIP), to improve the evidence base on the behaviour and fate of contaminants in during treatment processes. CIP phase 4 will include a Groundwater, Soil and Biosolids investigation. This will be looking at the fate and behaviour of multiple chemical compounds, including PFAS substances, to establish whether detected substances pose a risk to long-term soil health, groundwater quality ansd the wider environment.