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Agency confirms close attention to landfill gas sites

The Environment Agency has responded to comments made last week by the Health and Safety Executive over the potential for explosions at landfill gas power plants.

The plants burn methane to generate energy and continue to be installed at UK landfill gas sites. (see letsrecycle.com story)

A spokeswoman for the Agency said: “Management of landfill gas is improving. There has been a stepping up of regulatory control and this has brought significant improvements in infrastructure and operation, effective pollution control and an important contribution to energy generation – we now have 600MW of installed landfill gas capacity.

Permits
“There are risks with landfill gas. Our system of permits sets the controls necessary to minimise danger and we regularly inspect to ensure that landfill operators are complying with their conditions and the law – if not, we take action in line with our published Enforcement and Prosecution Policy.”

The Agency spokeswoman added: “Inspections do sometimes identify potential issues of health and safety, and we always share that information with the Health and Safety Executive, which is responsible for enforcing the law in this area. It is in the public interest, makes best use of our site inspections and is
in line with our Memorandum of Understanding with the HSE.”

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