Overloaded Sewer Hurts UK’s Bid to Become a Scientific Superpower

Beneath towering cranes and a new state-of-the-art laboratory in Cambridge are huge wastewater tanks — underground symbols of the UK’s struggle to overhaul its economy around life sciences and other key industries.

Developer Prologis Inc. installed the tanks because Anglian Water, the local utility responsible for treating trade effluent, didn’t have capacity. They were an expensive way to ensure tenants could work, but will also require frequent visits from honeysuckers, or vacuum trucks normally associated with rural homes and septic tanks, when the new building opens next year.