Untreated wastewater regularly flows into bodies of water

In Germany it also happens that dirty water sometimes ends up untreated in lakes, rivers and coastal waters. The reason is that, especially in large cities, dirty water and rainwater often flow into a single sewage system. To ensure that wastewater does not flow back into houses and streets during heavy rains and that wastewater treatment plants do not overflow, the sewage system is discharged using the so-called combined sewer overflow. A mixture of untreated sewage and rainwater flows directly into nature. The problem: in Britain this has almost become the norm. In some cases it happens even when it has not rained.

Basically, according to infrastructure expert and economic policy professor Dieter Helm of the University of Oxford, the combined sewer system is not the core of the problem. In fact, a complete separate sewage system would not be financed at all and would not be necessary, he says in an interview with the German Press Agency.

The dividends were financed by loans.

The problem is that in recent decades there has been little investment in the existing wastewater system despite increased demands and a growing population. According to Helm, this is due to a catastrophic failure on the part of the supervisory authorities: the water companies privatized in the late 1980s were not prevented from diligently paying dividends to their shareholders instead of investing, even with money. which came from loans.