Manywells landfill site in Cullingworth, near Keighley was licenced by Hillridge and owned by its parent company Wastepoint. But both companies went into voluntary liquidation in December and the liquidators disclaimed the licence and the land. The landfill site has now passed into the ownership of the Crown.
A waste management licence was issued in 1995 and this was modified in 1998 to allow more types of waste to be dumped at the site. When the licence was modified it also included new rules which said that the company had to provide money for the restoration of the site if they defaulted on their licence.
When the licence was modified, an agreement was drawn up between licence-holders Hillridge Ltd and the Agency to provide funding to restore the site. Financial provision was made in the form of a joint bank account in the names of Hillridge Ltd and the Environment Agency.The balance in the account in November 2001 was 375,000.
Simon Parrock of the Environment Agency, explained that the Agency is not sure whether or not it can access the money and is now asking the High Court whether it can legally use the 375,000. Because there is no licence in force, the Agency believes it no longer has powers to claim the money, do the work or order the work to be carried out. The Agency wants clarification as to what should happen to the money in these circumstances and who now has responsibility for the restoration of the site.
Mr Parrock said that he was hoping that the case would come to court in the next couple of months. He said: “We want to find out if we can legally spend the money and if we can't, what will happen to it as well as who is responsible for the site.”
Because there is no waste management licence in force, the Environment Agency does not have any regulatory powers over the site but is still monitoring pollution.
Jan Davie, environmental protection manager, said: “The Agency will continue to monitor the situation at Manywells to ensure there is no pollution of the environment or harm to human health. We would like to stress that there is no immediate environmental risk to the surrounding area and landfill gas generated on site is managed by a separate company, with a gas control system fully operational.”
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