Waste water sludge and PFAS testing (FOI)

Request 700269814

1. What amount of waste water sludge, has been provided to land owners for free by the government to fertilise their land in each month over the last 2 years and has it been tested for Pfas and Pfos? 

2. If it has been supplied and tested at what levels were the Pfas and Pfos by type known and what was the average accumulated level of Pfas and Pfos ? 

3  How much was supplied to growers? 

4 .How much was supplied to farmers 

5. How much was supplied to each if any of the 12 Parishes 

6. What happened to the remaining sludge ?

Response

1

The amount of waste water sludge broken down by month over the last 2 years is not held in recorded form. To respond to this request would require extraction and manipulation of data to produce new information.  A Scheduled Public Authority is not required to manipulate and create new data sets, Article 3 of the Freedom of Information (Jersey) Law 2011 therefore applies.

Waste water Sludge is tested twice a year for PFAS and PFOS.

2, 

The Government of Jersey is conducting extensive PFAS testing across various mediums, including groundwater, surface water, biosolids, food products, seawater, foam, and spray. These tests are part of a broader effort to inform the Scientific PFAS Panel's report on the environmental impact of PFAS.

It would not be appropriate to release these and previous test results in isolation, as they require context and comparisons with other jurisdictions, which will be provided in the forthcoming report. This work is considered policy under development and is, therefore, exempt from immediate disclosure. Releasing individual results prematurely, without comprehensive interpretation alongside other data, is not believed to be in the public interest. The final report, which is scheduled to be made public for consultation in late 2025, will provide a contextual assessment of PFAS in the environment in Jersey and publish the test results used.

Article 35 (Formulation and Development of Policies) of the Freedom of Information (Jersey) Law 2011 has been applied to the release of this information as PFAS and PFOS data levels in biosolids is still being collated, and samples are being sent to the UK for analysis in order to gain a comprehensive dataset.

Article 35 is a qualified exemption; therefore, a public interest test has been applied and is shown at the end of this response.

3, 4  and 5

Data broken down by much waste water sludge was supplied to growers, farmers and the 12 Parishes is not held in recorded form. To respond to this request would require extraction and manipulation of data to produce new information.  A Scheduled Public Authority (SPA) is not required to manipulate and create new data sets, Article 3 of the Freedom of Information (Jersey) Law 2011 therefore applies.  

6

The remaining sludge was incinerated at the Energy Recovery Facility. 

Articles applied

Article 3 - Meaning of “information held by a public authority”

For the purposes of this Law, information is held by a public authority if –

(a)     it is held by the authority, otherwise than on behalf of another person; or

(b)     it is held by another person on behalf of the authority.

Article 35 - Formulation and development of policies

Information is qualified exempt information if it relates to the formulation or development of any proposed policy by a public authority.

Public Interest test

In applying this article, the following considerations were taken into account.

Public interest considerations favouring disclosure 

• Disclosure of the information would support transparency and promote accountability to the general public, providing confirmation that the necessary discussions and testing have taken place.
• Disclosure to the public fulfils an educative role about the early stages in policy development and illustrates how the department engages with parties for this purpose.  

​Public interest considerations favouring withholding the information 

• In order to best develop policy and provide advice to Ministers, officials need a safe space in which free and frank discussion can take place – discussion of how documentation is presented and provided is considered as integral to policy development as iterations of documents are demonstrative of the policy development process. 
• The need for this safe space is considered at its greatest during the live stages of a policy. 
• ​The release of the information without comprehensive interpretation alongside other data could impact the general public with misinterpretation and generate misinformed debate. This would affect the ability of officials to consider and develop policy away from external pressures, and to advise Ministers appropriately. 
• Premature disclosure of this information may limit the willingness of parties to provide their honest views and feedback. This would hamper and harm the policy–making process not only in relation to this subject area but in respect of future policy development across wider departmental business.

Considering all considerations above, while transparency is important, the public interest in disclosure must be weighed against potential harm caused by distress or misinformation. 

It should also be noted that once a policy is formulated and published, the public interest in withholding information relating to its formulation is diminished, however, the use of the exemption can be supported if it preserves sufficient freedom during the policy formulation phase to explore options without that process being hampered by some expectation of future publication.

The SPA has concluded that, on balance, the risk of causing significant concerns or spreading misinformation, the public interest in maintaining the exemption outweighs the benefits disclosing the information. ​