Cat Smith Working for Lancaster and Fleetwood
On the back of my and Lorraine Beaver’s letter to the Secretary of State and requests for a firm date for an end to the odour, the Environment Agency have today said they have identified a breach of the environmental permit and served notice on the landfill operator to cap the problem ‘cell’ area, expecting this to be done by 15th May – but advising that residents should see a reduction in odour as it is constructed.
Residents in Fleetwood, Knott End, Cleveleys, and Thornton have been suffering for too long from this awful odour, and it’s right that the Environment Agency has has answered our calls to put a date on when this should subside. The local authority has questions to answer as to why they allowed the site to re-open to new landfill waste without updating residents, and as we know this happens up and down the country the government legislation is clearly inadequate and needs reviewing. But whilst we seek answers and long-term change, hopefully the community can begin to notice a positive difference over the coming weeks. In the meantime, we must continue to speak up as one united voice to say that this needs to stop, so please do continue to report the smell to the Environment Agency on 0800 807 060 to keep the pressure up to finally get this sorted.
Their update advises:
“I understand that you recently written to the Secretary of State with respect to Jameson Road Landfill Site, we have been asked to provide information in that response. I did, however, want to make sure that you had the most up to date information as soon as possible.
Our focus is stopping the unacceptable impact on the community. I can assure you that action is being taken by the Environment Agency to do that as soon as possible and hold the operator to account.
We have been working with UKHSA and have provided current health advice in the update of 15 March, please see attached. Also attached is todays update of 9 April, we will continue these updates regularly. We have created the below page to keep residents and partners informed as the situation changes. This page is being updated regularly, so please feel free to share this link with your constituents.
Since our visit in early February regulatory officers have been visiting the site regularly, this has included landfill engineering specialists and landfill gas specialists. In late February we started daily odour assessments within the community. We have deployed our drone to provide an overview of the activity and assess progress being made with engineering; including any measures being taken to better manage odour from the site. We have recently conducted some surface monitoring of landfill areas, known as cells, to determine any emission levels of methane and identify problematic areas. This will assist us further in building a picture of what is going on at the site and how we can help to minimise the impact on residents and the environment.
This regulatory activity has identified breaches of the environmental permit, we have made clear our expectation to the operator and directed them to undertake improvements and bring the situation under control. We are pressing the operator to deliver the improvements as quickly as possible to stop the impact on the local community and environment.
Jameson Road Landfill Site has both planning permission and an environmental permit authorising landfilling at the site. The current areas of landfilling also known as ‘cells’ are constructed to modern landfill engineering standards. In this case the restarting of landfilling activity and escape of odour and landfill gas has led to the community impact.
What measures the Environment Agency intends to take to prevent the release of gas and odour from the site?
It is ultimately the operator’s responsibility to prevent the release of gas and odour from the site. As regulator we will take action to ensure that the operator understands their responsibility and focusses on the issue.
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- We have increased our regulatory activity over the last 2 months, including visits from landfill engineering specialists, landfill gas specialists and regulatory specialists.
- We have deployed officers daily in the community to assess odour impact and gather evidence of impact on the community.
- On 18 March we issued a notice to suspend waste acceptance until the use of a ‘tipping bay’ on site was removed. That tipping bay was a source of offsite odour. The operator has complied and stopped using this bay. They are now tipping directly into the landfill cell and at a reduced rate of waste input, subsequently the notice was withdrawn.
- We have required the operator to introduce additional landfill gas wells to increase gas collection in an identified problematic area of the landfill.
- Today we have served notice requiring the operator to install a temporary cap on the problematic area to further reduce landfill gas emission and control odour. This may take several weeks to complete, however the community should notice a reduction in impact as the work is completed. We expect capping to be in place by 15 May 2024.
Work has been completed by the operator on the installation of 6 new gas wells which have now been connected to the gas management system. It will take a period to gradually increase extraction of gas on the site, alongside covering of the problematic area of the landfill we expect to see some improvement as this process takes place. We do recognise however that the additional work we require the operator to deliver is still needed to provide that assurance of gas and odour control.
Our action to stop the use of a ‘tipping’ bay on the site has subsequently reduced the volume of waste that Transwaste accept at Jameson Road. This may help reduce the traffic impact on the local community though is not directly controlled by the environmental permit. Transwaste is required to keep documentation regarding the loads they are accepting. They are required to submit waste returns to us for assessment. We will be auditing waste acceptance and inputs in due course; our immediate focus is on the control of odour and landfill gas emissions.
I have also included below their most recent community update and health advice form the UK Health Security Agency:
