The decision means that London-based Cory is expected to landfill up to 2.1 million tonnes of non-hazardous waste at the Kinderton Lodge Farm site over a 12-year period. This comes despite local opposition to the proposals.
We received nearly 250 representations from the community on issues like subsidence, surface water, flood impacts and landfill engineering. We have listened to these concerns and considered them in our final decision making
Claire Bunter, Environment Agency
In particular, the Environment Agency's decision notice reveals public concerns over issues such as the need for the landfill to be developed when local councils are already pursuing other treatment options, as well as doubts over whether the site will just deal with locally-sourced waste.
However, the EA stressed that the question of whether there was a need for a landfill had already been considered in 2007, when the Secretary of State gave planning permission for the site after a public inquiry.
And, it also said that a condition of the permit meant that Cory has to “record the quantity, characteristics, date of delivery and, where practicable, origin of any waste that is received for disposal.”
Explaining the EA's decision, its environment manager for Cheshire, Claire Bunter, claimed that it had been made based on environmental legislation and expert opinion.
“We received nearly 250 representations from the community on issues like subsidence, surface water, flood impacts and landfill engineering. We have listened to these concerns and considered them in our final decision making,” she added.
Non-hazardous
The environmental permit explains that Cory will be able to accept up to 275,000 tonnes of non-hazardous waste at the site every year, and a further 25,000 tonnes-per-annum of inert waste.
The list of wastes the site can accept ranges from by-products of various production processes through to both mixed and separately collected municipal wastes and packaging.
The Agency stressed that, once the site is up-and-running, it would license operations there and ensure that their impact on the environment was “minimal”, as well as carrying out regular inspections to ensure Cory was operating within the regulations.
Commenting on the decision, Cory said in a statement: “Cory Environmental welcomes the Environment Agency granting a permit for Kinderton Lodge. We are now producing a number of pre-development schemes, as required by the planning permission, which will need to be completed before work commences on site.”
Covanta
The Kinderton Farm Lodge site is just a few miles from the £200 million incinerator that US energy-from-waste specialists Covanta had proposed to build to deal with Cheshire's residual household waste (see letsrecycle.com story).
While the company is out of the running for that deal (see letsrecycle.com story), it has indicated that it believes there is still sufficient residual waste in the county for it to press ahead with its plans for the facility.
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