Town council keeps up pressure to monitor impact of waste incinerator

WESTBURY Town Council will continue to monitor air quality in the town each week to ensure that the developers behind plans to build a highly controversial waste incinerator stick to their planning conditions. New mayor, cllr Mike Sutton, stresses the importance of monitoring lorry movements and air quality in the town.

Planning permission for a £200 million energy-from-waste incinerator was granted by a government inspector in earlier this year and the town council opted not to pursue a High Court challenge after councillors were told the chance of a successful challenge would be around 30% or 40%.

The council will instead closely monitor the construction of the facility and to hold the developer, Northacre Renewable Energy Ltd (NREL), to account once the plant is functioning should NREL breach planning conditions.

Cllr Mike Sutton, who was voted in as mayor last month said, “Even if the judicial review was found in our favour it would most likely order the entire process to be rerun with exactly the same result. Following on from that decision, the town council voted to closely monitor all that occurs on the side with regard to legislation and the impact of the development. A task and finish group was set up to monitor the situation.

“As of yet no date set for building although we do not have to be informed. We have no right of inspection but if there are any repeats of past events such as odours and accidents, we will immediately ask the Environment Agency to intervene and make it public.

“We hope to monitor lorry movements to see if NREL follow their planning application. We have air quality monitors at various points in the town and will check them weekly to see if there is any increase – there is no benefit in having them outside the incinerator, and the readings are available to the public on our website.

“Wiltshire Council recognises there is an air quality problem in Westbury but are on record as saying they do not intend to do anything about it!”

Cllr Sutton has also called for a ban on HGVs travelling through the town at nights or weekends due to the pollution they cause and damage to roads and pavements.

An ex-employee of Hills Waste Solutions has claimed that extra lorry movements were made through Westbury to show an increased need for waste disposal, which would strengthen the case for building a waste incinerator in the town. He claims that drivers were told to divert to Westbury’s Northacre Resource Recovery Centre Mechanical and Biological Treatment (MBT) plant, often driving up to an hour out of their way, to push up the figures for waste being taken to the town.

Speaking to the White Horse News, the ex-employee said, “We’ve been told by managers and supervisors that we have to tip at Westbury – even if there are closer facilities. It’s 100% because the Westbury MBT plant has to have so much tonnage of waste going through it a week in order to justify the incinerator and the £200million investment.

“Sometimes we could be out near Amesbury, and they would tell us to dump a smaller first-load near there, but on the second load, when we have a lot more weight, we would be told to drive all the way to Westbury.”

The Hills Group refute these claims and say that waste is balanced between two sites in Wiltshire. In a statement they say, “The Northacre MBT plant has permission to treat up to 90,000 tonnes of non-recyclable waste of which 60,000 tonnes is contracted to Wiltshire Council. The Northacre MBT plant operates well within these limits.

“The site at Amesbury is used, amongst other activities, to bulk residential non-recyclable waste to be transported to the Lakeside incinerator located in Slough. Hills is contracted to deliver 50,000 tonnes of Wiltshire Council waste to this incinerator per annum. Both the MBT plant and Lakeside sites play a vital role in diverting waste from landfill and the transport of waste for treatment is therefore balanced between these two sites depending on operational needs and constraints.”

You can view the Westbury Public Air Quality Portal by visiting their website at www.westburytowncouncil.gov.uk