High Speed 2 Railway Line: Chilterns

(asked on 28th February 2020) - View Source

Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what assessment he has made of the extent of the (a) damage and (b) pollution of the chalk aquifers in the Chilterns as a result of the tunnelling activity of HS2 Ltd.


Answered by
Andrew Stephenson Portrait
Andrew Stephenson
Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
This question was answered on 4th March 2020

The Environmental Statement for Phase One of HS2 reports the results of the environmental impact assessment. This includes the effects on water resources, which are reported in volume 5: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/hs2-phase-one-environmental-statement-volume-5-water-resources

HS2 Ltd, which is responsible for the safe construction of HS2, has been working closely with experts from the Environment Agency and Affinity Water for a number of years to ensure that HS2 construction work does not cause contamination of the chalk aquifer, or in any way affect the ongoing provision of high quality drinking water from it.

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