Can old water treatment works land be used for grazing?

Gucc

Gucc

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As title really. There is some land that used to be used as a water treatment works, can it safely be used to graze horses?
I am interested in renting land adjacent the the new works which is smaller and enclised, but I believe that the grazing land I am interested in was part of the old treatment works

thanks
 
As MrsD123

Try to find out if the works used aluminium treatment to remove colour/organics or if the water treatement was slow sand filters.

Definitely soil test.
 
thanks for the responses.
Ive just checked an old OS map and it was actually sewage works and not a water treatment works, but I suppose the answers would still be the same? Ive contacted the agent to ask if soil tests have been carried out. If not where would be the best place to have the soil tested? Would the results be self explanatory or would I need to have the results reviewed by a professional?
sorry - loads of questions

thanks all
 
I personally wouldn't take it on. A few years ago now several horses were PTS after becoming ill when their field was contaminated by sewerage following severe floods.

If you can get satisfactory results to the soil being tested then good, for me there would always be a question mark.

Sorry for the negative reply
 
You can contact the local Environmental Agency, or the Ministry of Agriculture. There should be someone who is familiar with this sort of sampling, testing and interpreting results, its a matter of finding them.
In sewerage works, heavy metals are concentrated in to a small area, that would be easy to detect, but you need to be rigorous about the sampling.
There should be some sort of history here, so worth while looking in to it, is it being grazed by any animals at the moment?
 
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My friend has rented land off Yorkshire Water for the past 20yrs next to the treatment works. Her horses live out all year on there and she bred the Champion Trakhenar mare on there a few years ago.
 
My friend has rented land off Yorkshire Water for the past 20yrs next to the treatment works. Her horses live out all year on there and she bred the Champion Trakehner mare on there a few years ago.
 
Yes... It has been used for grazing horses previously but I'm not sure if they had the soil tested. I'm awaiting info from the agents to find out what has and hasn't been done previously. Thanks all for your info
 
The land should be fine, there are very tight environmental controls on the disposal of sewage and don't forget as a works, the site would have been regularly inspected, spillages reported and properly cleaned up.

There is however the risk that as next to the new treatment works if they were to have a burst rising main (for example) your land could get flooded, but again that would have to be cleaned up.

Modern waste treatment works aren't quite so bad as tend to be covered, but smell and flies, can also be a problem.
 
One last thought sewage treatment works by nature are placed on low lying ground, so the sewage can flow into them via gravity. So you would want to check the flood risk also. This information is available on the environment agency website (I believe).
 
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