Anglian Water propose new Waterbeach wastewater pumping station

Posted byCambridge Town OwlPosted inUncategorized

The problem is that there’s nowhere for the wastewater to be pumped to – the proposed destination of the relocated Honey Hill Wastewater Plant having been pulled by HM Treasury

(And that’s on top of Anglian Water’s reservoir issues)

The planning documents for this are in the GCSP Planning Portal here, and the reference to type into the search box is: 25/03813/FUL

It relates to the Waterbeach New Town (see the developer’s website at https://waterbeach.co.uk/) which is a core component of Cambridge and South Cambridgeshire’s housing growth. If the whole thing comes grinding to a halt, then there will be a huge gap in the housing targets – and the emerging local plan may be judged as unsustainable. Which is why we’re in this strange situation of a privatised utility potentially making or breaking the draft local plan. The only people who can resolve this are ministers.

In their own comments to their own planning applications, the problem is clear: The proposed Waterbeach Pumping Station for the new town under construction is meant to pump wastewater to the proposed site for the Cambridge Wastewater Treatment Plant at Honey Hill – the one that HM Treasury pulled rank on and withdrew funding after costs spiralled.

Above – Anglian Water’s response to its own planning application (as a statutory consultee for such things) Essentially a different, separate part of the business wrote this bit. It’s a bit like when a county council wants to build a new school or library and has to get comments from the highways authority – nominally itself but a separate unit within the institution.

This matters because the water quality of the River Cam and surrounding streams is something that local residents actively protest about.

Given the government’s growth policies, doing nothing isn’t an option.

“Where will the pumping station be?”

The proposed works are about 200m west of Bottisham Lock (see GMaps here)

Above – from the Location Plan diagram – those big green units are over 6m tall and the pumping lift poles are over 8m tall

Objections from Waterbeach Parish Council.

“Waterbeach Parish Council cannot see evidence that consideration has been given to the noise or odours that the pumping station will generate and no plan for screening this can be found. This in contrary to the policies within the local plan relating to the protection of neighbours’ living conditions and noise and odour control.”

Above – Consultee Comment, Waterbeach PC, 04 December 2025

Which strikes me as a basic oversight by the applicant given that those big storage tanks have a capacity of around 20,000 litres! Surely there’s going to be some odour created given the volumes of wastewater being pumped.

As things stand, the existing Cambridge Wastewater treatment plant at Milton is staying where it is, and Anglian Water are continuing to object to new housing and employment site developments that will increase the volume of waste it has to process.

So far, no news from ministers on what they intend to do about it.

It’s a problem that’s not going to go away either. With the draft Greater Cambridge Plan still out for consultation (only two of us showed up to the Cherry Hinton drop in session earlier today, which was a bit grim – not expecting huge numbers for the Coleridge one either tomorrow morning), water issues are one of the most prominent concerns from residents – the solutions of which are outside of the control of the city council planners even though it is a major dependency which could make or break their plans for the city. At which point they escalate it back up to the politicians and up to the ministers to resolve. The only options I can think of are:

  • Throw more taxpayers money at a heavily indebted private sector institution in a sector that’s getting lots of criticism
  • Issue directions on what the company should do – tabling new legislation if necessary – or ask them nicely if their owners and shareholders can stump up the funding needed
  • Nationalise the company and replace the board of directors so that the firm carries out the work that ministers say is needed to help deliver their housing policies.

There may be others – I don’t know much more about the detailed water-based discussions. But they cannot carry on as it is. And the delays will have a knock-on impact on when future planning applications can be built out.

Food for thought?

If you are interested in the longer term future of Cambridge, and on what happens at the local democracy meetings where decisions are made, feel free to: