Donald Trump’s Aberdeenshire golf course has breached sewage contamination limits 14 times since 2019, documents reveal.
The 36-hole golf course, one of two that Trump owns in Scotland, also has a five-star hotel, a whisky bar and two restaurants. Trump International Golf Links, Scotland has a private sewage system that treats wastewater before releasing it into the ground by soaking it through gravel beds in raised filter mounds.
According to documents released from the Scottish Environmental Protection Agency (Sepa) to the investigative journalism outlet Unearthed, however, groundwater samples of discharges at the course breached contamination levels on a number of occasions, including four times in 2024 and once in the first half of this year.
These samples exceeded limits for biomechanical oxygen demand – a measure of the amount of oxygen required by microbes to digest organic matter – suspended solid particles and ammoniacal nitrogen. These are all contaminants from human waste that has not been properly treated.
The agency categorised eight of the 14 incidents as “upper tier”, which it describes as “extreme events which have the potential to cause immediate and serious environmental harm” and can trigger enforcement action.
The US president is currently on a state visit in the UK. He is staying at Windsor Castle, and his trip includes a state banquet hosted by King Charles, a military flypast and other expressions of pomp and pageantry.
Keir Starmer has made getting a grip on the sewage problem blighting the UK’s rivers and seas a key mission for his government.
The executive vice-president of Trump International, Scotland, Sarah Malone, said that since the licence for the private wastewater system was issued in 2013, applications to renew it had never been refused.
“When the position was reviewed in August last year, leading environmental engineers submitted a detailed report demonstrating that there was no environmental impact from the way wastewater was being treated and this report was accepted by Sepa,” she said.
“It would be categorically wrong to suggest that our system was causing environmental damage and we would not hesitate to challenge such an assertion by any means necessary.
“From the outset, Sepa has insisted on a particularly intense level of monitoring of wastewater management at the site. A vast number of samples have been analysed by both Sepa and specialist environmental engineers we commissioned. The licence has not been breached 14 times – that is incorrect given that a certain number of exceedances are permitted when the frequency of monitoring is taken into account.
“Any exceedances have been very rare. We have been approved repeatedly by Sepa to continue the operation of our system more than a decade. The specialist environmental engineers we commissioned to undertake a parallel monitoring exercise contested Sepa’s findings on the occasional minor infractions. Those matters about methodology and sampling remain a matter of discussion between the engineers and Sepa.
“Far from causing environmental damage, we are extremely proud of the environmental contribution at our golf courses. Extensive native grasses have been planted, many hectares of indigenous vegetation have been translocated, and new wetland and dune-slack habitats are flourishing.”
A Sepa spokesperson said: “While we expect better performance, our risk-based assessment concluded the environmental impact in these instances was minimal.
“The treated effluent passes through a soak-away system after the sampling point, providing further natural filtration before entering the ground. The soak-away significantly reduces the risk of the effluent impacting the environment.”
Trump hosted Starmer at his Scottish golf courses in July. During a press conference, the president spoke at length of his “opulent and beautiful” resorts as the prime minister looked on in apparent discomfort. During the trip, Trump opened a new course at the Aberdeenshire site.
Trump International Golf Links, Scotland built the course on the Menie estate, north of Aberdeen, in 2012. Campaigners say construction damaged the dune system at the nearby Foveran Links, a site of special scientific interest (SSSI). Scotland’s protected areas committee decided in 2020 that parts of the dune system no longer merited the SSSI designation.
Sepa initially objected to the plans to build the course, partly because the resort did not have a connection to the public sewage system.
