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Ireland's political and cultural magazine
March/April 2022 73
Health ocer visited in 2018. He recorded
complaints of “nausea, headaches, irritation of
the eyes and stomach sickness”. He wrote that:
‘’The ponding was so thick and stagnant that
birds and wildlife were walking along this pond
of waste”. “Both solidified and liquid material”
were reported “at least 0.5-0.75 metres in depth”.
As for beginning the work on the Council
Cottages site, an Irish Water email dated 2
November 2021 made it clear: “As well as not
having the resources to run tender, we haven’t the
capability to do any required design work either’,
As to the Public Toilets and their unauthorised
connections, almost 10 years after first
prosecuting Galway County Council for a failure
to clean up the Council Cottages discharge, the
EPA commenced proceeding in 2021 against Irish
Water for the failure of the Public Toilet.
With no planning permission, no EIA, and no
Natura 2000 Impact statement, Irish Water
instead lined up on the dock at Galway 20
puraflow units for the Council Cottages, telling
residents that: “As there is no funding in place for
the site, this need will compete for funding along
with other national needs in the next Investment
Plan (2025-29)”. The February 2022 screening for
an Appropriate Assessment under the Habitats
Directive for the 20 units failed to mention the
adjacent protected lagoon. Called in by residents,
solicitors for Friends of the Irish Environment (FIE)
stopped all work on 11 February 2021.
‘Kilronan and Killeany Sewerage Scheme’. A
treatment plant was costed at €7.2 million with a
Time for Delivery of 2014.
On 6 June 2013 the Environmental Protection
Agency brought its first prosecution under the
Waste Water Discharge (Authorisation)
Regulations. In Kilronan District Court it
prosecuted Galway County Council for its failure
to control the pollution – from the Council
Cottages only.
In October 2014, a certificate of authorisation
was issued for a constructed wetland to deal with
the sewage – again only for the Council Cottages.
Good for one year, it was extended for a further
year, costed at €350,000, and never built.
A 2017 Galway County Council site-inspection
report again warned that: This cesspool poses a
serious environmental and public health and
safety issue”. But Galway County Council
published its own legal opinion the following year
that the matter was not the responsibility of
Galway County Council but of Irish Water.
The Health and Safety Authority Environmental
I
n Ireland, raw sewage runs freely from the
mountains to the sea. 54% of urban sewage
is classified untreated by EU legal
standards. There are 400,000 to 500,000
septic tanks across Ireland which an EU
Court case required Ireland to inspect from 2014.
The subsequent septic-tank inspection system of
1,000 per year shows average failure of over
50%. And of those failed, the failure rate of
householders to fix the failed systems has risen
every year since inspections began in 2014 - and
is now more than 50%.
Ireland is awash with raw sewage. It sinks into
our groundwater and contaminates our surface
waters, leaving us with the highest
cryptosporidiosis infection rate in Europe. The
debilitating parasite was responsible for the
virtual close down of Galway’s mains water
system in 2007. Statistics show an increase in
incidence in the last two years of 33%. And it’s
not just animal faeces. Recent studies have
shown toxic chemicals and pharmaceuticals in
wastewater have reached a third of global rivers,
causing not only pollution but contributing to the
build-up of antimicrobial resistance in humans
But nowhere can it be more flagrant than on
Inis Mór, the largest of the Aran Islands
(population 870). 160,000 tourists visit the
island each year. Each time they use the public
toilet in Cill Rónáin their faeces pool in an open
cesspit a few hundred metres below the village.
If it rains hard and there are many tourists, raw
sewage runs down the main street.
Up to a dozen businesses have unauthorised
connections to the small septic-tank system
which serves the Public Toilet and which now
overflows and ponds on the surface where the
original septic tank stands. In the next field, a
separate long-failed septic tank is host to the raw
sewage from 10 houses, known as the Council
Cottages, only metres away.
Both are separated only by a traditional stone
wall from a protected coastal lagoon, listed as
Annex I in the Habitats Directive – the most
important habitats.
Kilronan/Cill Rónáin was one of 46 schemes
approved by Minister Síle de Valera in 2003 at a
projected total cost of €350 million for some 46
schemes. It never happened. Water Needs
Assessments confirmed the need in 2006 and
again in 2009. In 2008, the Council published the
The ponding was so thick and stagnant that
birds and wildlife were walking along this
pond of waste. Both solidified and liquid
material were reported ‘at least 0.5-0.75
metres in depth
Inis Mórto
The biggest Aran island is awash with raw
sewage but after years of neglect a legal
action has been initiated
By Tony Lowes
ENVIRONMENT
