Scottish Water issue Seafield update following massive spike in odour complaints

All this week we have received a massive number of complaints of foul odour emissions in  the Leith area, believed to be from Seafield. Over 150 complaints have been recorded on our website and notified to Scottish Water, City of Edinburgh Council officers, Scottish Environmental Protection Agency, Veolia UK, Ben MacPhersons MSP, Roseanna Cunningham MSP and Councillors Booth, McVey & Munro for their attention & action.

A Scottish Water spokesperson has today published an update on Seafield.

Strangely, the public statement distances Seafield from the burning rubber / gas / sulphur type smell. Instead insisting that those odours are related to another (as yet unnamed) site in Leith, as confirmed by City of Edinburgh Council. However, at this stage the Community Council has not received any such confirmation of this from any body independent of Scottish Water / Veolia.

What’s even more strange is that the spokesman fails to address or even mention the foul odour of human sewage which has been sweeping across large swathes of our community.

A Scottish Water spokesperson said;

Following on from our community notification issued on Monday, we wanted to provide you with an update.Scottish Water logo

The storm tank cleaning that was scheduled for Wednesday 17th – 18th June was completed on schedule.

We are aware of a significant increase of odour complaints over the past few days, a number of which have detailed a burning rubber, sulphur and gas type smell.  As these type of odours do not necessarily correlate with the type of odour that is associated with wastewater treatment, we carried out an investigation of the whole site including the sludge processes and the surrounding area which identified a moderate to strong odour being generated at an industrial site near the docks, and is unrelated to Seafield wastewater operations.

 

This was confirmed by Environmental Health officials at City of Edinburgh Council and is currently being investigated by SEPA.

 

Looking ahead, there is some work required to the Intermediate Pumping Station. Any potential odours associated with this task have been assessed as low. This work will commence on Friday and should be completed same day. This is essential planned maintenance to limit the amount of grit that can pass through into the treatment process which can cause significant issues to site operations.

We will provide an update once this work is complete

 

I would be grateful if elected members and the Community Council could help and share this message on their Social Media channels.

 

Note: A copy of this communication will be posted on our website  – https://www.scottishwater.co.uk/seafield

Leith Links Community Council continues to encourage any member of our community who is negatively impacted by the release of foul odour emissions from the Seafield site to report such incidents via our website.

Our online reporting tool not only notifies Scottish Water, but simultaneously informs the Scottish Environmental Protection Agency, Veolia UK, Leith Links Community Council, City of Edinburgh Council (officers and Councillors Booth, Munro & McVey), the Scottish Governments Cabinet Secretary for the Environment and local MSP Ben MacPherson.