Severn Trent has revealed plans to reduce overflows at 900 locations across the Midlands.

A team of 300 people will help with schemes across the region which the water company says will cut 20 per cent of spills from storm overflows.

The scheme will start this year and run into 2025. 

The plan released today (May 17) features a range of initiatives including 700 new storage solutions at treatment works to capture more water during extreme rainfall.

Severn Trent will also supply 8,000 free water butts across 10 communities to "reduce surface water going into drains".

More than 70 new reed beds will be created to treat sewage at the storm route for storm overflows 

Liv Garfield, Severn Trent CEO, said: ''Our customers have told us they want us to reduce spills from storm overflows and we have promised to go as quickly as possible to deliver that. 

"This is why we've had an army of 300 engineers and data scientists working around the clock to test and trial a whole range of capital schemes to reduce spills from storm overflows – with the first storage tanks already in and to be delivered at pace each week.  

"Behind the scenes we've been working flat out to find new and agile ways of delivering complex capital schemes much quicker. At our peak we'll be building up to 40 tanks a week. We won't stop working on this until we've delivered on our targets.

''Since we launched Get River Positive two years ago, we've already made large-scale infrastructure improvements.

"Our share of impact on the health of our region's rivers has fallen to 14 per cent and we are confident this time next year our impact will have fallen to 10 per cent. This will mean that 9 in 10 reasons for rivers in the Midlands not achieving good ecological status will be down to other sectors.''

Severn Trent had previously allocated £384 million of investment for this capital delivery work in 2024/25 but that investment has now increased to £450 million.

Severn Trent has 2,472 storm overflows, more than any other water company given its region does not have a coastline.

It says around 350 storm overflows have not spilled in the last year. 

Last year the company reported 60,253 spills from storm overflows.