Business Stream and Veolia team up for water retail

The duo say their partnership will make use of Business Stream’s existing presence and experience in the water retail market, and Veolia’s global engineering innovation, to offer a “holistic approach” to water resource management, saving customers money as well as cutting carbon.

The two companies will work together to provide businesses with an “end-to-end solution” for all their water, energy and waste needs via a single provider – from the installation and management of on-site networks and processing facilities to the provision and management of water and waste resources.

Business Stream chief executive Jo Dow said: “We know that businesses in England are taking a fresh look at how they buy and manage their water and wastewater services as a result of the choices they will have available from April.

“Business Stream already provides retail and value-added services to a range of industries and organisations, but this collaboration will allow our customers access to Veolia’s breadth of expertise and extend the appeal and reach of our combined service offering to new customers throughout the country. By working together, we can offer customers a compelling combination of innovative, tailored solutions to help them deliver significant savings on their water and wastewater charges, as well as helping reduce their environmental impact.”

Veolia chief operating officer for water John Abraham said: “Opening up the water retail market to competition offers industrial and commercial customers an opportunity to benefit from the innovation and resource efficiency Veolia and Business Stream create.

“This partnership with Business Stream will provide clear long-term benefits to customers as together we can provide a complete retail water package which can reduce utility bills, supported by optimised on-site project engineering and operational solutions such as CHP and AD.

“Already we have seen increasing interest from existing Veolia customers in retail water services and this move will put us in position to deliver to this market.  We can offer an integrated sustainable proposition which guarantees security of water and energy supply and unlocks the value within process waste and wastewater which will produce economies of scale and cost efficiencies whilst putting the circular economy into practice.”

In December last year, Business Stream announced that it had teamed up with energy consultancy Utilitywise to offer business customers a multi-utility service. The companies said the new offer will enable business customers to secure “exclusive deals” for their electricity, gas and water, with access to smart online tools which will allow them to “take control of their utility spend”.

In June last year, the Scottish water retailer bought the business customer base of exiting Southern Water, and said it was keen to acquire further business customer bases following the deal.

Lois Vallely

This article first appeared on edie sister site, Utility Week