Sowerby Bridge incinerator plans: Calderdale campaigners gear up for fresh battle as firm makes another incinerator bid

In July last year, planning inspector John Woolcock dismissed an appeal by Calder Valley Skip Hire (CVSH), which wants to run a small waste incineration plant at its Belmont site.

Mr Woolcock concluded he could not find that granting an environmental permit to operate the plant would not have an adverse effect on human health.

His ruling was welcomed by campaigners who were very concerned about potential impacts on people’s health.

But the company has now submitted a new application to Calderdale Council for the key permit which would allow them to operate the incinerator.

CVSH has planning permission to run such a plant but needs an environmental permit to operate it.

The new application disputes Mr Woolcock’s ruling.

“CVSH considers the decision in material respects to be perverse as well as procedurally unfair,” say the papers.

CVSH claims it could have challenged Mr Woolcock’s ruling by judicial review but expresses concern another inspector might be left with residual doubt regarding explanation of elements of how the atmospheric dispersal modelling system used to assess impact of emissions works, particularly the effect of trees.

It has therefore chosen as “a better course of action” to submit a new permit application with an independent review, commissioned from Cambridge Environmental Research Consultants (CERC) to support their case.

This application is being submitted on the same basis as the original application but with further information from the hearings and CERC’s report, which the company claims confirms its dispersion modelling approach is appropriate.

A complicated history has seen Calderdale Council refuse planning permission for the incinerator and then that decision being overturned on appeal to the planning inspectorate.

Objectors then won the right to a judicial review of a subsequent decision by the council’s cabinet to grant an environmental permit, after which the permit was quashed.

Following this, the status of the permit application was deemed to be “undetermined” – hence the company’s appeal, which Mr Woolcock dismissed.

Comments on the new application can be sent to [email protected] or by post to Calderdale MBC Environmental Health, Halifax Town Hall, Crossley Street, Halifax HX1 1UJ, by 5pm on Monday, April 1.