A vegetable processing company has been ordered to pay £4,815 in fines and costs after polluted water from its Weymouth factory killed fish in a Dorset stream.

West Dorset magistrates, sitting at Weymouth, heard Express Potato Supply Limited of Eggwood Farm, Bowood Lane, Merriott, Somerset plead guilty to causing trade effluent to discharge into controlled waters contrary to Section 85(3) and (6) of the Water Resources Act 1991.

Environment Agency officers were called to the Granby Industrial Estate on March 29, 2004 following a report of dead fish at Chafey’s Lake. They reportedly found hundreds of dead fish at the lake, mainly roach and dace. The stream appeared slightly cloudy with a few small patches of foam, and the oxygen levels were very low.

The officers checked two other locations further up the river. One was slightly discoloured brown, but the second location was dark purple/brown with an earthy smell and a large quantity of foam banked up in the ditch below the outfall. The discharge was traced back through the drainage system to Express Potato Supply Limited.

An immediate investigation revealed that the factory had installed a new trade effluent pre-treatment plant for their vegetable washings. However, it had been wrongly connected to the surface water system leading into Chafey’s Lake rather than the foul sewer. The discharge was redirected to the foul sewer as soon as the problem was identified.

Some 233 dead fish were recovered from the scene, although there were more that could not be reached.

Today at West Dorset magistrates, sitting at Weymouth, heard Express Potato Supply Limited of Eggwood Farm, Bowood Lane, Merriott, Somerset plead guilty to causing trade effluent to discharge into controlled waters contrary to Section 85(3) and (6) of the Water Resources Act 1991.

The firm was fined £4,000 plus £815 costs.

Kevin Parsons from the Environment Agency said: "The vegetable washings stripped oxygen from the water as it naturally decayed in the stream and lake causing the fish kill. In this case the firm worked with us and the pollution was immediately rectified."