The site, at Edwin Richards Quarry near Rowley Regis, will see a range of activity including the placement of thousands of tonnes of commercial and industrial waste, as well as construction and demolition wastes such as soils, stones and concrete.
Plans to renovate the area have been years in the making, after the Quarry closed its doors in 2008 when stone quarrying activities stopped and the landfill reached full capacity.
Since then it has remained under the management of FCC – which submitted three separate planning applications in December 2014 for a proposed quarry infilling scheme, development of waste management facilities, and eventually, construction of up to 281 residential dwellings on the site.
While proposals to build houses on the southern edge of the site are yet to be approved, Sandwell has this month given the green light to FCC to develop waste operations, subject to conservation and noise management plans.
This follows a community consultation and a meeting of Sandwell council’s planning committee in July 2015 to gauge how the redevelopment will likely affect wildlife and the wider environment.
Facilities
As part of its self-described ‘masterplan’, FCC will establish a 150,000 tonnes-per-year soil treatment facility, as well as a 150,000 tonnes per annum construction waste materials recycling facility, a reposition landfill gas utilisation plant, a relocated leachate treatment plant, and a waste vehicle depot.
At the same time, the firm has also won permission to fill in the quarry void with soils, clays and excavation materials as part of the wider restoration scheme. The approved infrastructure will facilitate treatment of the soil, and it is expected some 6,000 tonnes of materials will be driven to the site per week.
In a non-technical summary supporting the original applications, FCC said: “The ultimate goal of the Edwin Richards Quarry Restoration Project is to provide greater beneficial after-use for the local community and reduce the health and safety management concerns associated with the site in its current uncompleted form.
“The ultimate goal of the Edwin Richards Quarry Restoration Project is to provide greater beneficial after-use for the local community”
FCC Environment
“The aim of the revised scheme will be to provide, in part, a usable and long-term facility for the local community, including biodiversity and landscape enhancements.”
Sandwell
Recommending the proposals in a committee report last year, Sandwell planning officer Mike Nicholls wrote: “It should be remembered that activities at the quarry have been negligible for over five years and that the proposed waste management facility together with the associated recommencement of infilling activities will inevitably lead to a noticeable change to the currently apparent circumstances.
“Overall however I am of the opinion that the proposed waste management facility is a reasonable proposal on what is a permitted landfill site, albeit one that is currently mothballed.”
Early work on the site to move the soil is understood to have already begun.
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