Anti-Incinerator Campaigners ‘Not Reassured’ by Brent Cross Plans

Following a heated debate at the Willesden Area Consultative Forum last Tuesday January 20th 2009, Brent Friends of the Earth (FoE) and the UK Without Incineration Network (UKWIN) are not convinced by the platitudes offered by the developers, whose plans for an incinerator plant are part of a proposed development at Brent Cross, Cricklewood.

At the meeting, which was attended by Brent FoE members and Jonathon Joseph of Brent Cross Cricklewood Devt. Partners accompanied by a technical consultant from a PR company, questions were raised over a proposed waste facility planned for Tilling Way that developers continue to claim is ‘not an incinerator’.

Viv Stein, Brent FoE Spokesperson, says:

The fact that developers have publicly admitted that dioxins [1] will be produced from this plant tells us that incineration processes will be used. We are not at all reassured and want to see specific and detailed calculations of the level of these emissions, which they have evidently calculated but not made explicit in the planning application.

The plant is clearly covered by the EU Waste Incineration Directive (WID) as spelt out in the planning application. If they are using refuse-derived fuel (RDF) to power this plant, this is waste and fuel being burnt, which is “waste incineration”, whatever the technology employed. We still have a host of unanswered questions before the desirability and public safety of this proposal can be assessed.

Shlomo Dowen, National Co-ordinator of the UK Without Incineration Network says:

Anti-incineration campaigners all over the country are looking at this proposal and wondering how the developers think they can get away with withholding information while asking to be trusted. We don’t trust them and we want to know why they are holding back important details, which makes us suspicious and unable to support this application. As it stands, the application cannot lawfully receive planning permission as the environmental statement is not complete; the applicant should be forced to provide the full information.

Brent Council has specifically requested a clause limiting the technology to gasification and stating that Barnet should not allow planning permission for incineration. However environmental campaigners [2] and local employers [3] have questioned whether these new types of technologies are any better than conventional mass burn incinerators, since gasification is still a type of incineration.

Brent FoE has asked both Brent and Barnet Environmental Health Departments for information on dioxin emissions and monitoring and are yet to receive a satisfactory answer [4].

RPS, the PR firm hired by the developers has a reputation for getting their sums wrong, as demonstrated at a plant in Nottinghamshire [5].

[1] At the meeting developers admitted dioxins would be produced, supposedly at low levels. Dioxins are one of the most highly toxic chemicals and are produced by the incineration process itself. They are extremely persistent in the human body. Under the EU Waste Incineration Directive they are only monitored twice a year and chloro brominated dioxins are not required to be measured at all.

[2] Gasification is a relatively new technology, but has been defined as incineration by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the European Union – http://www.no-burn.org/article.php?list=type&type=132

[3] http://www.derbyshiretimes.co.uk/chesterfield/Firm-threatens-to-quit-town.4598495.jp

[4] Brent FoE’s response to the Brent Cross Cricklewood Planning application p3 & 4 http://brentfoe.com/brent_cross.html. “We have sought information from Barnet Council Environmental Health department on the outputs and monitoring of emissions from the incinerator, and are yet to receive an answer. …We have also sought guidance from Brent Environmental Health, who were unable to comment on whether dioxins would be removed from the chimney and on the level and frequency of monitoring, without further information being provided on the process specification and fuel type. This leads us to conclude that not enough information has been supplied by the applicant for an adequate assessment of the health risks posed.”

[5] In Nottinghamshire, expert analysis of RPS’s original data revealed serious errors. The Planning Authority forced RPS to supply revised and corrected figures. These too were found to be in error! Expert analysis of RPS’ revised and corrected version of their Carbon Analysis resulted in the following conclusions:

RPS has now corrected the basic errors in their original climate change assessment report. It is alarming that such fundamental mistakes should have been allowed into the public consultation documents for this project and such blunders severely damages the credibility of the applicant and their consultants. In these circumstances it is hardly surprising that the public have little confidence in the competence of RPS to objectively and accurately project the impacts of the application. Perhaps even more worrying is that whilst correcting the original faults they have found several more, all of which fortuitously increase the impacts of the alternatives to the incinerator thus effectively reducing the gaps exposed by their arithmetic errors…

It is vital therefore that any claims made based on evidence from RPS is double checked for errors.