A Scottish brewery has been hit with a £10,000 fine after admitting accidentally contaminating water supplies.

Belhaven Brewery Company Ltd discharged some 8,000 litres of undiluted caustic solution into a public sewer when an automatic cleaning process went wrong, a court heard.

The discharge of concentrated sodium hydroxide in December last year breached health and safety guidelines.

Dunbar based Belhaven stopped the discharges when they discovered what had happened and alerted Scottish Water.

Scottish Water was forced to close down the treatment plant which discharges into the Biel Water, from where it drains into the Firth of Forth estuary, Edinburgh Sheriff Court was told.

Belhaven Brewery in Dunbar breached health and safety guidelines

They carried out a significant amount of work to reduce the volume of effluent flow reaching the treatment works, reduce spills to the environment and clean and replace essential filtration equipment.

SEPA were alerted and an Environmental Pollution Incident (EPI) was raised. On December 20, 2019, East Lothian Council took the decision to erect signs at Belhaven Bay Beach which warned of the risk of possible water contamination.

The signs advised against bathing in the sea or any nearby watercourses which flowed into the bay until further notice. The signs remained in place until 4 February 2020.

Sara Shaw, Head of Wildlife and Environmental Crime Unit said: “Belhaven Brewery Company Limited accepted liability, pleading guilty to a contravention of the Sewerage (Scotland) Act 1968.

“This incident caused extensive damage to the treatment works requiring intensive intervention and remedial action to restore the treatment works and protect the environment. There was significant public concern regarding water contamination.

“The Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service takes a rigorous approach to the enforcement of environmental crime - we are committed to taking effective and appropriate prosecutorial action.”