Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael)
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Question 544: To ask the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government the steps taken or proposed to ensure the improvement to eliminate the possibility of any pollution from sewage treatment plants; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [36969/05]

Dick Roche (Wicklow, Fianna Fail)
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Some €3.7 billion will be spent under the National Development Plan 2000-2006 on the provision of water services infrastructure. Some €2.2 billion of this will be spent on wastewater facilities. The EU urban wastewater Treatment directive requires specific wastewater treatment and-or collection facilities to be in place by 31 December 2005 for discharges from a graduated range of agglomeration thresholds. Record investment has meant that compliance with the end of 2005 requirements of the wastewater treatment directive, which stood at 25% at the start of the national development plan period in 2000, has now risen to some 90%. All remaining wastewater schemes required to achieve full compliance are included in my Department's water services investment programme.

The treatment standards achieved by individual wastewater treatment plants are identified in the regular reports produced by the Environmental Protection Agency in relation to urban wastewater discharges. These reports assist local authorities in focusing on operational deficiencies, where they occur, and also help my Department to identify new infrastructural requirements for inclusion in the water services investment programme. The current programme covering the years 2004-06 includes 869 individual schemes, of which some 570 relate to wastewater infrastructure, and it is available in the Oireachtas Library.