Does the river nile have raw sewage?

Answer 1

Yes. The river Nile has large discharges of sewage. There are a number of treatment plants around Cairo but largely sewage is discharged into the river delta and the river itself.

The annual flooding of the Nile has stopped. This was both a cleansing and enriching natural phenomena. A recent study has shown that human waste as well as agricultural by products have recreated a bloom of plankton growth in the eastern Mediterranean. This would have naturally occurred from sediments and organic compounds from the annual flood enriching the Nile valley and delta. Hundreds of villages along the length of the Nile discharge their sewage directly into the Nile.

At the point the river flow reaches Cairo the river water is surprisingly balanced although rich in organic compounds from human and agricultural waste. This feeds zoo plankton in the eastern Mediterranean which in turn has led to a resurgence in fish catches surrounding the delta.

There has been growing concern however regarding industrial effluent as Cairo becomes Egypt's industrial centre and factories spring up along the water ways that make up the vast Nile Delta.

It seems that at least in part the Nile Delta is still acting as a biological and contaminant filter despite losing its yearly deposits of sediment and silt. The physical erosion of the enormous Delta itself is now a growing concern as yearly sediment deposits would have maintained the physical structure of the Delta. This is a factor in rivers throughout the world which have been dammed.