THE COMPANY operating a landfill site near Naas, Co Kildare, has apologised to its neighbours for odours emanating from the facility – but blamed the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) for the continuing problems.
Dr Ted Nealon, environmental adviser to Neiphin Trading Ltd – also known as A1 Waste – said the EPA had “failed or refused” to give its agreement to “various infrastructure and necessary maintenance works” at its Kerdiffstown site.
“Neiphin Trading Ltd are concerned that the failure by the EPA to agree various proposals which would improve the environmental performance of the facility is preventing them from operating [it] in an orderly fashion,” he said in a letter to the EPA on February 3rd.
The improvements would include installing a temporary cap and “gas collection blanket” and the erection of a “curing shed” for compost being processed and landfilled on the site so that it would “not give rise to any gaseous emissions or odours”.
The EPA’s “refusal to agree to the compost curing infrastructure alone” was causing a “significant loss of revenue to the company, estimated at some €250,000 per month”, with a “considerable negative impact on the operation and development of the facility”.
According to Dr Nealon, Neiphin Trading had applied to the EPA for an extension to the landfill site in March 2009, but it was still awaiting a decision.
Clarification was sought on what additional information the agency required, “but no response has been received to date”.
In January 2009, the company had sought the agency’s approval for a “technical amendment” to its licence to monitor landfill gas but, apart from an acknowledgment no further response has been received.
“This . . . is now with the EPA for some 12 months”, he said.
In a public notice in the Leinster Leader, the company said the most recent amendment – to install a landfill gas collection system and temporary cap “to prevent any potential odours” had been submitted to the EPA last July and “no reply has been received”.
Neiphin Trading was also waiting for more than a year on a response from the agency to “clarification of alleged non-compliances” with the terms of its licence and also its queries about the legal basis for the EPA’s instructions to cease composting at Kerdiffstown.
The EPA has declined to comment on the case as it is currently taking a High Court action against Neiphin Trading, claiming that the company is in breach of a licence granted under the 1996 Waste Management Act.
The action is due to be heard next week.
A spokesman for Minister for the Environment John Gormley said demands by local residents that he should take action to halt “obnoxious” odours emanating from the site were misdirected, as enforcement was entirely a matter for the EPA.
In December 2008, the Kerdiffstown site was raided by EPA officers accompanied by gardaí, and a number of documents were seized.
An associated company, Dean Waste, was also prosecuted by Wicklow County Council for alleged illegal dumping.