THE Environment Agency (EA) say they ‘are minded’ to grant a draft permit for Northacre Renewable Energy Ltd (NREL) to operate a waste-to-energy incinerator on the West Wilts Trading Estate in Westbury.
The EA say that they have all the relevant information and ‘cannot find any reason to refuse the permit application’. The EA also say that they ‘only issue new permits if they are satisfied that NREL has the appropriate systems in place to operate the incinerator without causing harm to the environment or human health’.
There is an ongoing public consultation on this draft permit decision which is due to end on Friday 22nd April, and can be found by searching EPR/CP3803LV/A001 on the EA website.The EA will make their final decision once the consultation has closed on 22nd April.
Wiltshire Council is responsible for the planning process and councillors gave approval to the plant last June. A decision is awaited to see if Michael Gove MP, Secretary of State for Housing, Community and Local Government, will “call in” the plans for further scrutiny following a widespread backlash to the waste incinerator.
The EA is responsible for issuing an environmental permit, to enable the incinerator to operate if it is built. The EA say that they are aware that the planning decision is under review, but this does not stop them from making a decision regarding the permit.
The draft permit notice from the EA reads, “We have reviewed all the comments you sent us, along with the documents submitted by NREL, and have considered all the evidence very carefully. As part of this consideration, we have explored several issues of concern, such as the possibility of products from Arla Dairy becoming tainted by emissions from the incinerator.
“Concerns like these caused us to ask for more information from NREL, in the form of Schedule 5 notices, and when we received this information, we made it available to you on our Citizen Space web portal.
“We are now satisfied we have all the information we think we need and cannot find any reason to refuse this permit application. We are therefore now ‘minded to’ grant this permit to NREL.
“This means we think we may grant the permit based on what we know so far, but we have yet to make a final decision. Before we do, we would like you to read our draft decision document and let us know if there is any further information you would like us to consider.
“We understand that this may not be the news you were hoping for. We are bound by the requirements of the Regulator’s Code to grant permits to companies, provided we cannot find any evidence that the building or operation of such a site may cause significant harm to the environment or to human health. Wiltshire Council decide if the location is suitable for an incinerator and if such a facility is needed in Westbury through the planning application process.”
NREL, who plan to build the waste incinerator, is owned by UK power producer Bioenergy Infrastructure Group and Wiltshire-based waste management company, The Hills Group. Hills Waste Solutions came under fire last summer over how long they took to fix a faulty biofilter at the Northacre Resource Recovery Centre on the trading estate, which led to Westbury residents complaining about a ‘consistent and awful stench’ that blighted their summer.
White Horse News reported back in November that Westbury town councillors would be ‘extremely surprised’ if the complaints about the ‘awful stench’ coming from the Hills waste plant weren’t taken into account when a licence to operate their planned incinerator is granted, because of Hills’ connections with NREL.
The report from the EA says, “We also understand that you may have concerns about the competence of the operators, due to the odour issues experienced by the Westbury community throughout 2021. This odour originated from the existing Mechanical and Biological Treatment (MBT) plant, which is operated by Hills Waste Solutions.
“The proposed incinerator, although partly funded by Hills, will be operated by Northacre Renewable Energy Ltd. This is a separate business and we must therefore treat their permit application completely separately to our regulation of the MBT plant; our decision cannot be influenced by other sites we regulate.”
