Investigation into Tesco milk disposal
An investigation was launched after milk from Tesco was drained into the sea after a power cut spoiled food at the weekend.
Concerned members of the public raised the issue on Monday with police and Scotland’s Environment Protection Agency (Sepa), claiming the incident may have been illegal.
The supermarket apologised for all of the disruption caused by the power outage as well as not following the “strict policies” in place for food wastage.
When asked by The Shetland Times for comment, Tesco said said it was investigating the incident and reported it to Sepa.
“We have strict policies in place to dispose of all waste products, and we are sorry that these appear to not have been followed on this occasion,” Tesco said.
Sepa confirmed it had began to investigate the siutation and found it was milk that had come from tesco.
It said disposal down the drain was an “acceptable” solution for the supermarket to take but Tesco had decided to change how it was throwing away its spoilt milk.
“Having checked with Scottish Water, who confirmed that there were no issues at the pumping station, it appears there may be a misconnection within the store’s drainage system,” Sepa said.
It added it was satisfied there was “no risk” to the environment, given the quantity of milk and its “dispersal and dilution in the sea”.
Sepa said it would continue to investigate the misconnection.
When approached by The Shetland Times, Scottish Water said: “We checked our infrastructure and everything was working as it should.”
SIC environment chairwoman Moraig Lyall was unaware of the pollution when asked by this newspaper on Monday but said she would be disappointed to hear if any substance was illegally dumped into the sea.
“I would not be terribly happy with things going into the sea, if they are not supposed to be,” Mrs Lyall said.
Last Friday a power cut, which was experienced briefly across Shetland, caused the store’s fridges and freezers to malfunction. The units were unable to keep the products cool enough for sale to the public.
This meant almost all of the products had to be binned, with shelves left bare over the weekend.
An apology was issued, with customer notices displayed on shelves.
In response to questions from The Shetland Times, Tesco said: "We are sorry for the inconvenience caused and are working to get this issue resolved. We currently anticipate frozen and chilled food to be available again at our Lerwick Superstore from Monday."
It added the food which was taken from the shelves as a result of the power loss would be "converted into animal feed or turned into energy".
Indeed, that was the case as staff members were packing the shelves with new stock at lunchtime on Monday.