ARMED GARDAÍ and Customs officers discovered one of the Republic’s largest illegal fuel laundering plants during a major raid close to the Border in Co Monaghan.
The plant was found when a search team backed by armed members of the Garda’s Regional Support Unit moved in on a property at Drumacon, Castleblayney, yesterday morning.
They found a sophisticated, large-scale operation capable of laundering an estimated 20 million litres of fuel annually.
Run to full capacity, the illegal plant would have cost the exchequer some €11 million per year in taxes and duties forgone.
A man in his 40s was arrested at 6.30am at the site, which appeared to be a scrapyard. Gardaí were still questioning him last night. The area was sealed off and a major search operation continued throughout the day.
Some 37,000 litres of laundered fuel were found, and about 200 bags of bleaching agent. The agent was being used to launder agricultural dye from the fuel, thus readying it for sale as regular motor fuel, worth almost twice as much on a garage forecourt.
Gardaí and officers from Revenue’s Customs Service found three skips filled with toxic sludge – the byproduct of the fuel laundering, or washing, process. Equipment such as pumps and hoses used in the laundering process was dismantled and seized.
The laundering of green diesel was taking place in tanks concealed inside 40-ft trailers.
“Bleaching earth” was being mixed into the diesel to remove the green dye. The fuel was then passed through a filter before being pumped back into tankers used to deliver fuel to garages.
After the tanks had laundered a load of diesel they were being washed out, and this toxic “wash” was being piped into a number of skips. This residue was in turn being fed through hoses into drains in adjoining fields.
The find was the culmination of a lengthy intelligence-led operation by gardaí and Customs officers.
“We hope the message is getting out that we are paying significant attention to this type of criminality,” said a Garda source.
Monaghan County Council is investigating whether the local Lough Ross water scheme in the area and just north of the Border in south Armagh may have been contaminated by the toxic sludge.
Sludge was being dumped via pipes into ditches on the property – some of which had been dug for the purpose.
Kieran Duffy, senior executive engineer with Monaghan County Council, said the case was one of the worst he had seen.
“There is total disregard for the environment . . . they built a purpose drain beside the facility to take the run-off from the site. It is crazy; if it got into a stream it would kill fish and plant life, the concern is it’s quite close to the Lough Ross scheme; we have to do more investigations to see if that is the case,” Mr Duffy added.
The extent of the disregard for the environment was echoed by Seán Kelleher, assistant principal officer in charge of Customs enforcement along the Border.
“Normally you will see the waste in for disposal afterwards. Here it is allowed to percolate into the earth. It is horrendous what I am looking at here; I can’t believe people are doing this to the environment.”
The plant was located at the rear of what appeared to be a car and truck scrapyard. Monaghan County Council is investigating whether the site had planning permission and a licence to operate.