A REED bed designer believes the sewerage system has a good potential for water treatment and pollution control - but not for livestock farms.

Andrew Joiner, senior partner in Iris Water of Castleton, believes reed beds could not cope with the large quantities of solids produced by livestock, but they could be attractive to farmers diversifying into bed and breakfast accomodation, holiday cottages and the like.

Mr Joiner was speaking during a visit by the North Yorkshire Farming and Wildlife Advisory Group to Botton Village, near Danby.

Botton, part of the Camphill Village Trust which cares for people with learning difficulties and special needs, has operated its own reed bed sewage system for three years.

Designed by Mr Joiner, it deals with all the effluent from the 220 residents.

Mr Joiner gave the background to the Botton system and explained how it worked, but he said he personally would not advise reed beds for livestock, because of the amount of solids generated by the animals.

"Farm waste is much stronger than human waste and it needs more oxygen to break it down," said Mr Joiner, who said Birmingham University had begun looking at reed beds for farming, but had given up.

However, for farm diversification such as B&B or holiday cottages, it could be worth considering.

"If you wanted to get really big you could even take brewery waste for example, treat it through a series of reed beds and charge the brewery for doing so," said Mr Joiner.

The treated water could never be used for drinking, but it could be re-used for toilets or field irrigation.

He admitted that reed beds worked better in warm weather - when the water is warmer - than in cold periods, when the system slowed down.

Planning permission and building regulation consents are normally needed for reed bed systems and the Environment Agency also needs to be involved.

However on hearing that there could be an EA charge of as much as £1,100 a year for licensing and monitoring the system, a farmer claimed it took away any incentive to introduce such a system.

One view expressed was that reed beds did have a huge potential, particularly in preventing leaching from land fill sites, rather than in agriculture