Almost £50million is set to be invested to improve the rivers and water treatment plants in East Lancashire.

United Utilities has today announced it will be spending £40 million in Burnley and Hyndburn and a further £9.5m in Rossendale to improve the waterways, to make them more resilient to heavy rainfall.

Burnley and Hyndburn wastewater treatment plants will be upgraded so they can treat greater volumes during heavy rainfall, and the sewer network at Pendle and Burnley will be upgraded to provide greater storage capacity.

This will improve 23 kilometres (14.3 miles) of Pendle Water and the River Calder.

Rossendale wastewater treatment works will be upgraded to provide greater storm water storage capacity, improving 7km (4.4 miles) of the River Irwell.

Work has already been completed at Darwen and Blackburn wastewater treatment plants to increase the storage capacity.

Along with other process improvements, this is already improving 13km (eight miles) of the River Darwen.

In total, it is hoped the investment programme will reduce sewer spills into the environment by more than 10 million tonnes a year - the equivalent of 4,000 Olympic-sized swimming pools.

There will be a further £14m spent at the Horwich wastewater treatment works and nearby sewer network and £2.3m in Chorley, looking at the feasibility of creating a vertical reed bed at one of the storm overflows on the sewer network.

This will improve 5km (three miles) of Syd Brook.

The investment is announced on the day United Utilities has retained the top four-star rating for its environmental performance in 2021.

Jo Harrison, Director of Environmental Planning and Innovation at United Utilities, said: “We know there is always more to do, and playing our part to improve the health of the region’s rivers is very important to our customers.

“This is already well underway and, by 2025, we will have invested £230m improving 184km of waterways and we will have developed our plans to progressively reduce the impact of storm overflows in the coming years.”