Kent refuse derived fuel (RDF) company Waste4Fuel faces fines and costs totalling nearly 9,000 after a prosecution brought by the London Fire Brigade, which has been called to the firms Orpington site 12 times in the last year.
At Bromley Magistrates Court on Thursday (February 27), the company pleaded guilty to maintaining a stack of flammable material larger than the size allowed without the permission of the fire authority.
The company was fined the maximum of 1,000 and ordered to pay costs of 7,860 plus a 100 victim surcharge a total of 8,960.
Waste4Fuel has been under heavy scrutiny from the Environment Agency, fire services and local MPs due to the storage of thousands of tonnes of waste bales and a number of fires at the site on Cornwall Drive over the past year.
The London Fire Brigade said it has sent more than 550 fire engines to 13 separate fires at the site since December 3 2011, with 12 of the fires taking place in the last 12 months. The latest fire occurred at the site last Monday (February 24) and the Brigade said in total the call-outs represent over 1,958 working hours and more than 560,000 in time and firefighting resources.
The prosecution also follows comments last week from the Environment Agency that it was disappointed with the Waste4Fuels progress in removing waste bales and fitting fire breaks at the site and was seeking a return to the High Court as soon as possible (see letsrecycle.com story).
Consent
London Fire Brigades fire safety officers began inspecting the Waste4Fuel site after a blaze on March 18 last year, at which time there was estimated to be around 6,000 tonnes of stacked waste material. Officers then notified Waste4Fuel that it would need consent to store the material under the Greater London Council (General Powers Acts) as the stack was so large.
‘We have made some real headway in removing the waste we have invested in some new machinery on the site. Now we are working closely with the fire brigade and they are now confident we can deal with future issues ourselves.’
Shelley Hurst, new managing director of Waste4Fuel
According to the Fire Brigade however, the companys application in May 2013 for this consent was refused as the stack posed a high fire risk and its size would make firefighting difficult.
A subsequent survey of the site found that the waste material on the site was 573,475 cubic feet around 12 times larger than the 48,000 cubic feet permitted. Stacks larger than 48,000 cubic feet require legal permission.
London Fire Brigades deputy head of fire safety regulation Mark Andrews said: While we welcome this conviction we are fully aware that there has been a history of problems at the Waste4Fuel site on Cornwall Drive, with firefighters being called out to attend 12 incidents there in the last year alone. This causes considerable distress and disruption to people in the area, as well as placing an on-going drain on our resources, and we are continuing to work with the Environment Agency to resolve the problem once and for all.
Waste4Fuel
Waste4Fuel which collects and sorts waste such as tyres, plastics, cardboard, metals and paper at the site for processing into a refuse derived fuel (RDF) originally had its environmental permit suspended on April 22 last year and was ordered by the High Court in October 2013 to remove all the waste and fit fire breaks at the site by the May 1 2014 deadline.
Former director of the firm, Bryan Hughes, previously told letsrecycle.com that he was absolutely committed to removing the waste, but he has now left Waste4Fuel after the company was bought-out earlier this month.
Having been involved in the purchase of the company on February 1 2014, new Waste4Fuel managing director Shelley Hurst told letsrecycle.com: What happened was undeniable and we accept that. But what has happened, happened, and we are moving forward now.
We have made some real headway in removing the waste we have invested in some new machinery on the site. Now we are working closely with the fire brigade and they are now confident we can deal with future issues ourselves.
Ms Hurst said that she was confident of meeting the Environment Agency deadline and was looking to turn the companys operations towards commercial energy-from-waste generation at the Cornwall Drive site.
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We have bought the company with a long term plan. What we are looking to do is move into waste to energy with thermal heat on the site. We wouldnt normally take on a site like this, but we saw an opportunity and things are going really well.
She added that any energy-from-waste facility at the site in future would be small scale and that the company was looking at connecting the facility directly to the national grid.
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