The company had denied three charges – two for breaching environmental permits, and a third for discharging untreated sewerage effluent from its East Worthing wastewater treatment works.
The Environment Agency (EA) said 40 million litres of raw sewerage was released due to a failure at the treatment works in September 2012. The discharge led to the closure of beaches between Southwick and Ferring for days.
Southern Water was cleared of charges relating to the proper maintenance. It told the court that three blocked pumps at the East Worthing facility had caused the release. The pump failure was unexpected.
The company’s emergency plan to discharge sewage into the sea was activated in order to prevent it backing up in the sewer network and flooding properties.
The trial at Chichester Crown Court is continuing regarding the third charge.
A version of this article first appeared on WWTonline.