By ZOE CONWAY
The news correspondent of the British Broadcasting Corporation.
The analysis shows that sewage is being dumped in rivers on a regular basis.
It found that seven water companies in England and Wales discharged sewage into rivers and the sea thousands of times.
The water industry acknowledged that action was needed to address the problem.
Last week, MPs warned of a "chemical cocktail" of pollutants tainting England's rivers.
The committee said raw sewage and microplastics were putting health and nature at risk.
The water industry was skirting poor regulation by the Environment Agency, according to a retired professor of computational biology.
"In some cases, multiple sewage works are spilling into the same river causing damage for long periods of time, sometimes spinning as long as four months, six months almost without a break," he said.
He calculated that the seven companies discharged sewage from 59 treatment works that treated 4.5 million people's wastewater.
Water companies are allowed to discharge sewage into rivers during heavy rains.
The image caption is.
Pollution is a problem in many rivers.
If the conditions are dry, they can be acting illegally. They can be breaking the law if they don't treat enough sewage before they discharge it.
The data from the "event duration monitors" check every 15 minutes if a treatment works and if it is discharging sewage into a river. He compares the data with the data on how much sewage the companies are treating.
In response to the report, the United Utilities, Southern Water and Welsh Water questioned the accuracy of some of the data while Yorkshire Water said that Professor Hammond had "fundamentally misunderstood" the data.
The report states that the sewage treatment works at Dorking were the most responsible for spills.
Over the last four years, sewage was discharged into the River Mole. The analysis suggests that they wouldn't have been allowed by the rules if the weather was too dry or the sewage hadn't been treated properly.
All discharges of sewage that isn't treated are unacceptable and will be stopped by the government, the Environment Agency and the water company.
The Environment Agency is failing to detect thousands of illegal spills because it is not scrutinising the available data closely enough.
It's like the Environment Agency is looking through a telescope and we're looking through a microscope.
Water UK said that all the water companies agree that there is an urgent need for action to tackle the harm caused to the environment by overflows.
The Environment Agency will take appropriate action where there is evidence of noncompliance.
They said that 1,300 storm overflows and storm tanks at waste water treatment works have been identified as "spilling frequently" and that a major investigation into possible unauthorized spills at thousands of sewage treatment works is ongoing.
There is sewage.
Pollution.
There is a person named Rivers.
The environment.
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