North Kent River Basin Catchment

We have developed the first Drainage and Wastewater Management Plan (DWMP) for the North Kent River Basin Catchment.

We have 5 wastewater systems in this catchment, with 103 pumping stations and 1,038 km of sewers. We cover 11% of the geographical area (mainly the urban areas and villages including Sittingbourne, Faversham, Sheerness and Minster) with 93% of the homes in the catchment connected to our wastewater systems.

Our DWMP sets out our priorities for the North Kent River Basin Catchment. These include:

• Reducing the number of spills from the 33 storm overflows which together currently spill around 300 times per annum
• Separating or attenuating excess rainwater in the sewer networks to reduce the risks of flooding and frequency of storm overflow discharges, especially in Queenborough and Sittingbourne
• Investigating the potential impact of wastewater discharges on the Sarre Penn and River Wantsum and the measures needed to achieve Good Ecological Status
• Investigating the potential impact of wastewater discharges on the Swale, Medway Estuary and Marshes and identify the requirements to secure Nutrient Neutrality
• Planning for potential significant development at Faversham, Sittingbourne and the Teynham Area of Opportunity
• Identifying the impact of storm overflow discharges on shellfish waters at Faversham and the Swale
• Assessing the condition of sewers to identify groundwater and saline intrusion in Queensborough
• Improving the resilience of our networks and treatment works to prevent pollution incidents, particularly in Sheerness and Faversham
• Reducing the risk to groundwater by reducing leakage from our sewers in Faversham and Sittingbourne.

All the stages we followed in developing the DWMP for North Kent are set out in the subsections below. Please explore these pages to find out more. You can find detailed investment needs in the tables on the North Kent Options Development and Appraisal page.