The road gully into which a woman poured a small amount of coffee – and was briefly fined – discharges unmitigated into the River Thames with all the toxic runoff from roads in the area.
Thames Water has told me that the gully near the train station in Richmond, Surrey is linked to a surface water drainage sewer system (rather than a combined sewer system with domestic waste water) linked to an outfall on the Thames. A Thames Water map shows that there is no facility to mitigate the runoff at the outfall.
This means that although the small amount of coffee poured away by Burcu Yesilyurt would – when it rained – have made its way into the river, it would have joined many gallons of rainwater contaminated with oil residues, tyre and brake wear particles, heavy metals, and other organic matter.
The government is providing “substantial capital funds” for a programme to tackle toxic runoff from its network, a top National Highways official has said.
The comment from Ivan Le Fevre, the company’s head of environment strategy and standards, follows a recent publication that identified “182 confirmed high priority locations where outfalls or soakaways present a high-risk of pollution”, with an expectation that a total of 250 would be mitigated by 2030.
Le Fevre has published on LinkedIn a blog that he wrote in September “primarily for an internal company audience”. He wrote:
Government is providing substantial capital funds, through to 2031, to deliver a programme of improvement – and expects to see efficient and effective results that dramatically reduces the level of pollution risk and provides value for money for the taxpayer. Getting this programme right disproportionately matters to the company’s reputation over the next five years.
To illustrate the importance of the issue he referenced two hearings held by the Environmental Audit Committee.
At one of these, at the beginning of September, National Highways chief executive Nick Harris said the company was “proceeding on the basis that we will be funded to do all 250” sites.
National Highways has declined to confirm that it will meet a pledge to mitigate by 2030 all outfalls that pose a “high-risk” of polluting the environment with toxic road runoff.
The company has published a document that its director of environmental sustainability, Stephen Elderkin, described on LinkedIn, as “detailing 182 confirmed high priority locations where outfalls or soakaways present a high-risk of pollution”.
But, while the locations are confirmed, the pledge to mitigate them appears far less certain.
The detailed document and map represent the next stage of the government-owned company’s 2030 Water Quality Plan, which:
sets out a high-level programme of work that achieves the plan to mitigate all high risk outfalls by 2030
However, that document also emphasizes that:
Delivery in RP3 will be subject to funding being agreed through RIS3.
Elderkin’s statement National Highways has “committed to mitigate the risk at high-risk locations by 2030 with the installation of new or upgraded treatment facilities” conspicuously lacks the word “all”.
The new document states that it:
contains details of sites confirmed through these processes as having an confirmed risk of pollution at the end of August 2025. These high priority locations include a total of 182 assets.
It adds:
We expect that, in all, approximately 250 outfalls and soakaways will be confirmed as requiring new or upgraded treatment systems by 2030.
While Elderkin stated that:
In total, we expect to deliver improvements to around 250 locations
this is a statement of expectation without a date.
Similarly, the new document conspicuously avoids making firm commitments. It lists for each location:
Thames Water has joined Richmond Council in refusing to say where road runoff goes next from a gully into which a resident famously poured a small amount of coffee, raising concerns that toxic pollution may be flowing unmitigated into the river whose name the company bears.
The highway authority made national headlines when its enforcement officers fined Burcu Yesilyurt £150 for pouring a small amount of coffee down the gully outside Richmond Station, only to rescind the fine on the grounds that she had only committee a minor contravention of Section 33 of the Environmental Protection Act 1990.
The reality is that, aside from the small amount of a relatively innocuous liquid, whether it was “likely to pollute land or water” would depend on what the gully drains into.
This would either be into the combined sewer system or a surface water only sewer, both likely operated by Thames Water.
If the former, there is no pollution risk; if the latter, the pollution risk would pale into insignificance compared with the risk from other runoff from the road, including oil spills, particulate matter and microplastics from tyre and brake wear.
With Richmond Council refusing to tell me, I asked Thames Water, who also refused to say but didn’t deny that it was its sewer.
This is an astonishing situation where two major organisations, one a public authority and one a private company fulfilling a public function, are refusing to be straight with the public about a matter of significant public concern.
Richmond Council’s statement that it had withdrawn a fine against a woman who poured coffee down a drain, while still alleging that she had committed an environmental offence, leaves many questions unanswered, including the question of defamation.
In brief, if the drain (gully) discharges into the combined sewer system, any coffee poured into it would end up in the same place as coffee tipped down a nearby sink. If however it goes into a nearby watercourse, there is a lot more to worry about than a small amount of leftover coffee.
In revealing that it had revoked the fine against Burcu Yesilyurt, the council doubled down on its claim that she had committed an offence under Section 33 of the Environmental Protection Act 1990, which, as the BBC says, “makes it an offence to deposit or dispose of waste in a way likely to pollute land or water, including pouring liquids into street drains”:
It is likely that, had this case progressed through that route, the notice would have been rescinded because it is a minor contravention which the recipient agreed not to repeat.
The council also told the BBC that it is:
committed to protecting Richmond’s waterways
The implication of all this is that the gully discharges into a waterway, rather than a combined sewage system. But when I asked Richmond Council’s press office to clarify this, they refused to answer.
National Highways is set to be given funding and a clear target to tackle toxic water runoff from its roads under a new-style “National Programme” in the forthcoming road investment strategy (RIS 3).
The government-owned company is under pressure to tackle the contaminated water that runs off the strategic road network (SRN) into sensitive waterways in particular.
Last month Parliament’s Environmental Audit Committee (EAC) challenged its chief executive, Nick Harris, on its plans and funding.
He replied without explanation that it expects to be “funded to do all 250” of the “high-risk” outflows on the strategic road network that it has prioritised for mitigation.
It has now emerged that water quality will fall under a National Programme for environmental mitigation, as floated in the draft RIS 3 published in August:
We are considering introducing new National Programmes to deliver defined outputs that support RIS objectives or commitments which are not within other programmes (for example, supporting specific programmes of activity around safety and environmental mitigation).
The company has since published a Preliminary Design Playbook, produced by consultants and setting out measures to mitigate high-risk outflows.
In an interview with New Civil Engineer, Stephen Elderkin, director of environmental sustainability at the government-owned company, said:
Rather than having different design teams coming afresh to each of those locations, given that we’ve now got a national programme, we’ve centralised it.
He added:
We take pollution contained in water running off our network incredibly seriously. It can contain heavy metals, hydrocarbons, tyre crumbs and other particulates and without suitable management of that runoff there is a risk of polluting water bodies where it gets discharged into water so this, this matters. It matters for health and it matters for ecosystems; it’s quite an extensive problem.
It’s fair to say that National Highways chief executive Nick Harris got a bit of a kicking from MPs yesterday – on the subject of failed tree planting – but he was allowed to give a very vague answer on the subject of funding for cleaning up water pollution.
To recap, Harris and the company’s director of environmental sustainability, Stephen Elderkin, were in front of the Environmental Audit Committee to talk about biodiversity, including tree planting, as well as what the company is doing to mitigate the toxic runoff from its roads.
The headline on water pollution is that Harris said the company had mitigated just 40 “high risk” outlets since he last appeared before the committee in 2021 but now estimated that there are another 250 approximately, which it has pledged to mitigate by 2030.
That is the date – the original end date for the third Road Investment Strategy (RIS 3) in March 2030 – given in National Highways’ 2030 Water Quality Plan, subject to funding of course.
Harris described this as a prioritisation process of getting stuck into the very worst locations, adding that the company has 180 locations where it is developing designs, with more high risk locations expected to be identified.
The problem is that National Highways has no funding for this at the moment. It has a promise of nearly £25bn up to 2031 under the draft RIS but no specific funding streams. Ministers have promised a new focus on repairs and renewals, alongside a long and growing tail of enhancement schemes but there are as yet no designated funds for the environment, for example.
Labour MP Olivia Blake raised the issue of funding and asked Harris what certainty he had that the company would be able to meet the target on mitigation. He replied with wishful thinking:
We’re proceeding on the basis that we will be funded to do all 250. The interim year hasn’t affected our design work. We’re moving forward on the assumption that it’s all going to be funded.
He went on to explain the convoluted process by which National Highways, the Office of Rail and Road and the Department for Transport work towards a final RIS 3 by 2030.
With National Highways appearing before the Environmental Audit Committee on Wednesday, Transport Action Network (TAN) has published another piece in its National Highways Watch series – this time on “Toxic Run-Off”.
This covers the company’s plans, or lack of them, to address the pollution being discharged from its network into the natural environment.
Once again, I have contributed to the TAN piece, despite a lack of co-operation from National Highways, although I would stress that the phrasing used is not necessarily mine. It does punch quite hard, but by no means unfairly.
The piece also quotes from research by Stormwater Shepherds, a group doing great work on the issue, whose UK director of operations, Jo Bradley, will also be appearing before the committee.
The group has pointed out that while Section 100 of the Highways Act 1980 allows highway authorities like National Highways to discharge surface water into any inland or tidal waters, a discharge of polluting matter into a watercourse would usually require a permit from the Environment Agency, and argued that the company is not exempt from enforcement action in this area.
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