Paris races to clean up the Seine before Olympic swimming events

In Paris, one Olympic race has already started: the race to clean up the River Seine

Lesson summary

Hi there everyone, I’m Jeff and this is Plain English, where you get to learn about current events and trending topics—and you get to do it in your new language, in English. You know, what we give you here is this: stories about what’s going on in the world; mini lessons on how to use a popular English expression; and a lot of great online resources to help you learn.

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Today’s story is about the race to clean up the Seine. The Olympics start in just under three months. Paris organizers have promised the river will be safe and clean for swimming before the opening ceremonies. Athletes who compete in long-distance swimming and the triathlon are looking on nervously, since recent tests still show elevated levels of bacteria.

So you’ll learn about what Paris has planned for the Olympics in the Seine, and what they’ve been doing to clean the river up.

In the second half of the lesson, I’ll show you how to use the English expression “run through.” And remember, if you finish listening and you want to get more involved in these lessons, really practice using what you learn, then check out all the lesson resources at PlainEnglish.com/671.

Let’s dive in—figuratively.

Scramble to clean up the River Seine

There’s a painting in London’s National Portrait Gallery: “Bathers at Asnières.” It was painted by the French artist Georges Pierre Seurat, and it shows two bathers in the water and others sitting on the riverbank. The river is the Seine.

Seurat completed this painting in 1884, back when it was common—and safe—to swim in the Seine. But as Paris industrialized, waste was dumped into the river with abandon, and the famed waterway became ever more polluted. Finally, in 1923, Paris banned swimming in the river because the water was filthy. By the 1960s, only three species of fish were hardy enough to survive in the polluted water.

Now, one hundred one years have passed since swimming was banned, and Paris is racing to make the Seine swimmable again. The city is hosting the Olympics this summer. And Paris has promised that the Seine will be swimmable. It better be. The Seine, after all , is where the triathlon and marathon swimming events are to be held.

This is a bold bet. The Seine is a beautiful river: you can argue that it’s the most beautiful river running through a city center in the world. But ever since industrialization, it has been dirty. Making it swimmable is a monumental task.

In the old days, direct pollution was what made the Seine filthy. But today, it’s wastewater.

Wastewater from homes and businesses is normally diverted into treatment plants, where the water is treated before being released back into the environment. But when there is heavy rain, the city’s drainage system is overwhelmed, and wastewater goes directly, untreated, into area waterways. That raises the level of dangerous bacteria in the water—and that is what makes it unsafe for swimmers.

To combat this, Paris has invested €1.5 billion in several projects over many years. One project is to build massive underground tanks that can store excess rainwater when the drainage system is overwhelmed. When it rains, the tanks will hold water that runs off from the street, allowing the drainage system to handle wastewater from homes and businesses. After the rains have stopped, the tanks will gradually send the stored water to the treatment plants. They hope that this prevents unwanted wastewater from reaching the Seine.

Another project dug up the pipes beneath tens of thousands of homes, to better route wastewater away from the river. A law from 2018 banned boats from discharging wastewater directly into the river.

The projects have helped, but it still may not be enough. A recent analysis of the water showed E. coli bacteria remain well above the recommended levels for swimming. Advocates for athletes say the river is not clean enough for swimming under any circumstances.

Elevated levels of E. coli put swimmers at risk of skin and stomach conditions: swimmers involuntarily swallow about half an ounce of water per hour when swimming long distances. The recent analysis showed two to three times the recommended level of E. coli in the water. That’s not something you want in your system, even if you only swallow small amounts.

So what happens if the river isn’t ready? Olympic organizers insist there is no Plan B: the Seine will be ready for swimming in June. They argue that the bacteria levels are seasonal and that the test samples were taken after a period of unusually high rains.

But organizers do admit that unexpected rainfall remains a risk. If there’s heavy rain in the days before the competitions, they’ll have to postpone the events until the bacteria levels fall.

Not everyone is worried. French swimmer Marc-Antoine Olivier said “swimming in a historic place is going to be incredible” and an Italian swimmer called it “a glittering setting.”

Even apart from the swimming, the Seine figures prominently in the city’s Olympic plans. The opening ceremonies have always been held in a stadium. But this year, the opening ceremonies are planned for the river. Hundreds of thousands of people are expected to crowd the banks of the river to see the first floating Olympic opening ceremonies.

Organizers hope the river cleanup will be part of the legacy of the Paris games. After the Olympics are over, Paris plans to open more than twenty swimmable areas along the Seine, including four in the city center.

If the Seine opens to swimmers, it will be a decades-old dream come true . Jacques Chirac, a former president, was mayor of Paris in 1990 when he promised to make the river swimmable again; that was a promise unfulfilled. The current mayor is Anne Hidalgo. She has promised to swim in the Seine before the Olympics.

But a French news article pointed out that she has yet to get her feet wet.

Jeff’s take

No Plan B. I mean. I can understand wanting to put all your energy into cleaning up the main site. But no plan B! This is risky. The Olympics are only two weeks; what if there’s rain? What if there isn’t rain and it’s still not clean enough?

If you’ve been listening long enough, you probably know I’m a critic of mega-events like the Olympics and the World Cup . Mostly I think they’re bad for their host cities. But Paris seems to be doing it right. And if the Olympic legacy is cleaning up the river and making it safe for people to enjoy and swim in, then I’m all for it.

I am looking forward to seeing the opening ceremonies. I never watch the opening ceremonies. But they’ll be floating down the Seine in the city of light—that’s going to be one to watch.