The Isles of Scilly’s pristine paradise is set to become a shining beacon of excellence in water management – we're proposing a major investment aimed at vastly improving water and wastewater services on the islands.
Our vision is simple: thriving communities, protecting precious wildlife, and crystal-clear waters, all powered by our dedication to high quality practices and cutting-edge technology.
This isn't just about ticking boxes; it's about creating a legacy of resilience and excellence. Our aim is to ensure that every resident and visitor on the islands will be able to enjoy wholesome and safe drinking water. But that's not all – we need to ensure that the future stays bright by securing a plentiful supply of water for generations to come.
We’re currently consulting on our proposals for a new water treatment plant on St Martin’s and new wastewater screening plant on St Mary’s. Thank you for sharing your views.
These consultations closed on 16 August 2024.
St Mary’s wastewater proposals
There will be a separate planning application for each of our proposals, ensuring that each one is tailored to each island. We’ll be holding consultations for each of these proposals over the coming months, before we finalise our applications and feedback to help shape our proposals before we submit our planning applications later this year.
• Reduce pollution
• Protect the islands’ pristine coastal waters
• Protect and enhance the islands’ precious wildlife and natural environment
• Provide innovative sustainable solutions to the islands’ water quality issues
• Keep bills fair for you
Across all of these improvements works, we will be sympathetic to the unique nature of the islands and to minimise impact on all habitats, wildlife and communities during construction and operation.
The Isles of Scilly is a precious archipelago, with its pristine coastal waters and environment providing home to a unique blend of nature and wildlife. Their status as a National Landscape reflects the national importance and the vital contribution these islands make to wildlife, climate and our wellbeing.
We’re committed to ensuring that our programme compliments and protects this status. We will carefully design our programme to ensure that we respect the landscape, and minimise our impact on protected areas and local communities.
Through delivery of this new investment programme we’re committed to:
• providing at least a 10% biodiversity net gain
• exploring a range of sustainable solutions such as energy recovery and solar panels
• working with local communities to identify areas where we can invest into the community to maximise the benefits and provide economic benefits – such as creating jobs and facilitating new housing
We’re at an early stage of developing these proposals for improving the water supply and wastewater services. You know the area best, so we need your views and feedback to help us enhance our proposals.
We held drop in information events across the islands in November 2023 and in January 2024 to introduce our programme. Thank you to everyone who joined us and provided feedback.
A lot has been happening since then, with surveys and investigations to inform design development, and preparing to start working this summer on the welfare compound on St Mary’s and our new water supply distribution pipeline on St Martin’s. You can read more about what’s been happening in our newsletter.
If you have questions about our investment programme, please don’t hesitate to contact us via email or post.
Email: IoSProject@southwestwater.co.uk
Address: FREEPOST – SWW Isles of Scilly Improvement Works