JOINT COMMITTEE ON THE ENVIRONMENT, HERITAGE AND LOCAL GOVERNMENT díospóireacht -
Tuesday, 25 Jan 2011

Kerdiffstown Dump: Discussion with Clean Air Naas

Chairman

We are dealing with the fourth item on the agenda, a presentation by Clean Air Naas committee on Kerdiffstown dump. I welcome Mr.Brian McGeever, chairperson, Mr. Joe Friel, Ms Anne Fitzpatrick, Mr. Seán Keane and Mr. Richard Gibbons from Clean Air Naas committee.

I remind members of the long-standing parliamentary practice to the effect that they should not comment on, criticise or make charges against any person outside the Houses, or an official by name, or in such a way as to make him or her identifiable. By virtue of section 17(2)(l) of the Defamation Act 2009, witnesses are protected by absolute privilege in respect of their evidence to the committee. If witnesses are directed by the committee to cease giving evidence on a particular matter and they continue to do so, they are entitled thereafter only to a qualified privilege in respect of their evidence. Witnesses are directed that only evidence connected with the subject matter of these proceedings is to be given and they are asked to respect the parliamentary practice to the effect that, where possible, they should not criticise or make charges against any person, persons or entity by name or in such a way as to make him, her or it identifiable.

I now invite the representatives of the Naas Clean Air committee to make their presentation and a short question and answer session will follow.

Mr. Brian McGeever

I thank the Chairman and members for inviting us to appear before the joint committee this afternoon.

Clean Air Naas, CAN, was formed in early 2010 with one of its primary purposes to try to achieve some reasonable conclusion on the dump facility in Kerdiffstown.CAN believes the EPA has not in any circumstances fulfilled its functions as a licensing authority. I understand the EPA will appear before the joint committee later to present its annual report 2009. The EPA's mission is to protect and improve the natural environment for present and future generations taking into account the environmental, social and economic principles of sustainable development.

In the first slide of our powerpoint presentation, members will get an idea of the location of the dump relative to the town centre. The dump is situated on a site of 50 acres approximately one mile from the centre of Naas and located beside housing estates such as Morell, Oldtown, the Park, Monread and Aylmer. This area, known locally as the Monread triangle has a significant population.

The landfill facilities, as are many throughout the country, is located in a disused quarry, from which sand and gravel was extracted for 50 to 60 years. It is a poor aquifer and is porous. This means that leachate will percolate down through the layers into the substratum. It makes it a prerequisite to line these landfill sites, but that did not happen in this case. Neiphin Trading Limited, a subsidiary of Deane Waste, trading as A1 Waste, commenced acceptance of waste at this site in 1996. The EPA issued licence No. W0047-01 in 2003 to Neiphin Trading Limited but almost immediately the company was in breach of licence with non-compliance notices being issued by the EPA. In 2006, despite these non-compliance notices, the EPA issued enhanced licence No. W0047-02. The previous licence allowed the facility to accept construction and demolition waste, whereas the enhanced licence allowed it to accept other types of waste. It is beyond belief that the EPA can contend there is no hazardous waste at the site even though no record is available of what is on the site. However, it is not the only authority which is out of order in this regard. Up to and including 2005, there were significant unauthorised developments on the site but at no stage did Kildare County Council take a prosecution. The public file was withdrawn in 2007.

The next slide contains two photographs, the first of which is of Corranure landfill facility, County Cavan. All these facilities have problems in terms of fugitive gas emissions but if they are managed properly one can live with them. The second photograph is of Kerdiffstown. A photograph may tell 1,000 words but this one understates the problems we face in Kerdiffstown. A visit to the site would show that the situation is unbelievable.

In May 2010 the dump was effectively closed by court orders prohibiting acceptance of further waste on site. The EPA alleges there are at present 1.1 million tonnes of illegally dumped waste on the site. Incredibly, the bond acquired as part of licence No. W0047-02 was paid in the first year but not thereafter. Somebody, whether in the EPA or the county council, should have taken responsibility for collecting the bond. I do not know how much money was involved but it certainly would have alleviated some of the current funding issues that appear to impede the clean-up of the site. No landfill levy was ever collected from the site. Based on the EPA claim of 1.1 million tonnes of waste, a landfill levy of €25 per tonne implies a loss to the Exchequer of €27.5 million. This is €2.5 million short of the current estimate of the cost of cleaning up the facility.

The EPA's strategy is to legally pursue the companies involved and their directors. Meanwhile, residents of Naas, Kerdiffstown and Sallins will continue to deal with serious pollution until measures are taken to clean the site. As there is no security at the site, it is being raided and stripped. Between ten and 12 significant fires have erupted to date. Last Thursday, a deep seated fire erupted in a pile of woodchips and it is still burning today, with smoke present in the atmosphere. Over Friday night and Saturday morning, nine calls were made to the EPA's emergency line but they went unanswered. When the matter was taken up on Monday morning it was not deemed an emergency. The official responsible for making the decision is based in Wexford. It is beyond belief that it was not deemed an emergency. The next slide contains a photograph of a fire that occurred in one of the bailing stations in November. As members can see, it was quite ferocious. It burned for several hours, releasing significant amounts of pollution into the atmosphere.

Neiphin Trading Limited is in liquidation. Jensoph Limited, which owns the land, has postponed a creditors meeting. Dean Waste, which is the holding company, is in receivership. The EPA sent a file of alleged wrongdoing to the Director of Public Prosecutions in late 2009 but no action has been taken to date.

The photograph in the next slide is like an iceberg in that it reveals only a fraction of a huge pile of rotting waste which is emitting gas and accumulating leachate. It has not been capped or lined. That is incredible in this day and age.

Mr. Joe Friel

The most important question for members of the committee and the general public is the impact the dump is having on the surrounding area. The population of Naas and its environs, including Kerdiffstown, Johnstown and Sallins, is 30,000. This community lives within two miles of the dump. The odours from the site are hideous and residents are unable to sleep at night unless they close their windows to keep out the smell.

The facts I will present to the committee come from an EPA expert report. We are not being creative or conducting our own professional analysis. The EPA has been concealing the proof of the site's pollution from the public. The SKM expert report commissioned by the EPA estimates that gas production over the next 30 years is up to 50,000 l per day. That gas output could run a medium sized power station. The report in its full form was promised to Kildare County Council late last year but it was only delivered as a censored document. That is disgraceful behaviour by a Government quango towards a local authority. The first ten pages were completely redacted and the technical appendices were not included. I want the EPA to explain why it took this step. The report was written on 20 October but it was not delivered to the council until 24 December in the hope it would not be noticed after Christmas. That is the type of Christmas present the EPA has given the people of Kildare.

On the pollution effect of the dump, quoted in the SKM report and not made up by us, the leachate plume is moving towards the Morrell river, which is a tributary of the River Liffey, which provides drinking water for the Fingal County Council area. That is a disgraceful situation for us but it is a big, big issue for Government because it is not now a small problem in Naas. It is a significant problem pouring down the hill, and it could seriously affect the health of most of Ireland's citizens if it is not tackled now. That is how big it is. How dare the EPA sit on this report for two months and not bring it to the attention of the local authority? In fact, this report has not even yet been given to Fingal County Council - that is how bad it is. It is a terrible situation.

The EPA expert report, which is this SKM one, - we are not making it up - refers to a certain item called ammoniacal nitrogen, which is highly toxic, being 27 times the maximum permissible under EU/Irish standards. It is not ten times, not 17, but 27 times. Based upon our conservative calculations, this dump is spewing out more leachate, which is the same as raw sewage, as 100,000 people each year. That is the sheer volume coming out of it. Who here in government could state we have a town with no sewage and there is a population of 100,000 in it.

The photograph in the presentation shows what it looks like. The committee is welcome to come and look at the dump. It is lying wide open, without security. One could drive in today with a 40 ft. truck. In fact there was a low-loader in there this morning loading up more plant and equipment and we have reason to believe that is not even being done in a professional manner. It is being loaded up and sold off quietly. Some €50 million worth of plant and equipment has left that site and to the best of our knowledge, the liquidator has not got one red cent from it.

The dump is on the perimeter of Kerdiffstown House and the expert report confirms that there is a migration of pollution on to the site. Kerdiffstown House is a holiday home for the elderly operated by the Society of St. Vincent de Paul. That is where the pollution is going. We suspected that this leachate was going into the Society of St. Vincent de Paul facility. As late as 20 December last, the EPA declined to tell Kildare County Council the identity of the lands being polluted and this report, which was delivered on Christmas Eve to Kildare County Council, confirmed the identity of the polluted lands. It is completely unacceptable.

We ask the Chairman, the committee, and particularly Deputy Hogan, to address these issues with the EPA. The committee has the joy of having its representatives in here after us. We have repeatedly contacted Dr. Mary Kelly, who has refused to date to meet us.

The EPA is legally prosecuting the operators. Mr. McGeever quoted the names of three insolvent companies. The EPA is chasing tenuous legal cases. Fair enough, the EPA can continue to spend the taxpayers' money on those. It is more of an issue for Government as to where that goes. All we are asking is that simultaneously the EPA engages in a clean-up of the dump. The EPA is not willing to engage in a clean-up of the site until it concludes the aforementioned High Court cases. We believe the EPA's cough is softening in that regard but at present the situation is as I outline. Neither we nor our fragile environment can afford to wait any longer.

What residents of Naas want is the following. First, we want an immediate site clean-up, which, in the EPA report, is costed at approximately €30 million. The site needs to be secured to reduce the possibility of malicious fires, one of which is ongoing since Wednesday last and, apparently, cannot be put out. There is a local authority official present and perhaps he might confirm for the committee that such is the case. However, the fire is still smoking and the local authority still has a considerable issue with it. It would be cheaper for Government to pay for security as opposed to have five units of the fire brigade there for days.

We want capping to limit leachate generation. Rainfall increases the scale of it. Currently, the site is producing 50,000,000 litres of leachate, which, I reiterate, is equivalent to the sewage produced by 100,000 people each year.

Gas flaring should be installed in the site. This would eliminate 95% of the fugitive gases and consequential odours. It is simple technology. One need not hold a doctorate in environmental science to know how to do this stuff. One need only use cop-on.

There is a need for leachate extraction to restrict the plume from creating further environmental damage. This is also straightforward. If this is not an emergency, which is a word that the EPA is unwilling to use at present, we do not know what is. Genuinely, that is the position.

As to how can one achieve all of this, section 56 of the Waste Management Act 1996 allows the authorities to step in where pollution is likely. The authority, in this situation, is the EPA. All we ask is that the EPA use its legal rights to go in and sort it out straight away.

However, the EPA requires funding to expedite this issue. Therefore, we require the Minister to issue a ministerial order in respect of making available the funding required out of the landfill levy fund over the coming years. Quite simply, we call upon Government to immediately release that funding and get that clean-up under way as soon as possible.

The clean-up must be carried out by contractors who are independent and suitably scrutinised, not by a bunch of cowboys. Most certainly, we have seen enough of them in Kerdiffstown. The site must be returned to its original farming base at the conclusion of the process.

I highlight again that we have repeatedly tried to contact Dr. Mary Kelly, and particularly on the back of the report received earlier this month. We all received the same copy of a wonderful letter from the EPA. This is a disgrace coming from a public body. It states that the EPA must be careful in these communications with the likes of us not to compromise any current or future court cases.

Chairman

Is that not a valid point?

Mr. Joe Friel

It is a very valid point until the circumstances are considered. This relates to three companies that are insolvent. If anybody in this room is owed money by a company that goes into insolvency proceedings, who here would hold out hope of getting a few bob out of it? In most cases, it would be on a wing and a prayer.

We are not questioning the EPA in pursuing its legal cases. It is most welcome to do so. All we want the EPA to do is get in and clean it up. It can be recovered. Certain politicians have already confirmed it can be done simultaneously without compromising matters.

The environment is not ours. We simply act as guardians for future generations. Now the EPA must act and ensure no further pollution of our drinking water and protect our fragile environment. I thank the committee again. I appreciate the time given to us.

Chairman

I thank Mr. Friel. I will ask for a brief observation from the members and then come back to the delegation. We will start with Deputy Fitzpatrick.

Deputy Michael Fitzpatrick

I welcome the delegation to the committee and thank it for the presentation which has been most enlightening. Would Mr. Friel further outline the report from which he quoted and how he came on it? What is the most damaging piece of information in that report, in Mr. Friel's view?

The county engineer in Kildare, Mr. Joe Boland, is quite concerned about what is happening out there but it is not under his control. I also understand that the fire lighting at present cannot be put out in the conventional way and it will continue for weeks, and maybe months, if nothing is done. It will be pouring pollutant into the air for a long time to come.

The Department of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government needs to provide funding, not merely the normal funding provided every year but a special allocation, in respect of this project. This is the worst case of pollution I have ever seen. I have been to look at the site and I noted the smells. I know the people of Sallins, Naas, Johnstown, Kerdiffstown and all the adjoining estates. It is outrageous what is happening out there.

I do not know whether the people of Dublin realise that the Morrell river runs close by the site and it is quite possible that it will be affected soon with leachate from it. That feeds - correct me if I am wrong - into the Liffey which feeds into Dublin, and some of that water would be used by businesses and people in Dublin. This is probably one of the most serious issues in the country and we need to take action.

I cannot understand why somebody has not taken the initiative to provide some protective railing and gates. It is unreasonable to think that a 60 acre landfill like this is left wide open and that people with lorries and low-loaders can drive in and load up and go away, and that nobody is there to shout stop. As a Deputy for the area, I assure the committee that I do what I can. I know we can blame the EPA but we need immediate action and funding from the Department, which has a fund for this sort of process. It must give it over to some agency, be it the local authority, a private contractor or the EPA, to start remedial work on the site as a matter of urgency.

Deputy Emmet Stagg

I welcome the deputation from Naas CAN. They are not professionals, they are citizens affected directly by what has happened at Kerdiffstown. I thank them for taking up the case and sticking with it over a long period, particularly those Kerdiffstown residents who were fighting the case on their own for a long time until the gas arrived to stink out Naas over Christmas 2009, which brought matters to a head. Kerdiffstown was affected for a long time before that. I also appreciate the wide-scale and high level support for the case that is now apparent and I hope it continues. Their presence today indicates that these people are being taken seriously at national level.

The dump is an unmitigated disaster for the Kerdiffstown, Naas, Johnstown, Sallins and Kill areas and has potential to do serious damage to air quality. A scientific report from a public body indicates that there is a real danger of an explosion in nearby houses as a result of gas from the landfill and that the water serving Dublin city and north Kildare may well be polluted arising from the leachate that runs freely from the site.

The points made by the committee are valid; the EPA is unable or unwilling to act effectively. I think the EPA is unable to act, as I have said to CAN on a number of occasions. There was a need for a change in the legislation to give powers to the EPA similar to those the health board has over restaurants, where if there is a breach of conditions, the restaurant is closed. If he or she does not like the order made by the health board, the restaurant owner can go to court then but the EPA is in the opposite situation where it must get evidence to close a place down. Collecting such evidence in a way that is suitable for presentation in the High Court is time consuming and as a result, this disaster is continuing.

I would like to see the legislation changed in that way and I urge the committee to consider recommending such a change to the Minister. That would enable the EPA to act immediately on breach of licence instead of needing to get proof that is acceptable in a court of law so it could then order closure until the matter is rectified.

The present situation must be rectified, it cannot be allowed to fester. It is now causing real damage. There is a new Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government, although he will only be in office for a short time, Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív, and he now holds the purse strings of a fund that is ring-fenced for exactly that purpose. That fund yielded €39 million last year and this year it will yield €69 million. All of the €30 million indicated in costs are not needed in one year, it will take a number of years to carry out the work necessary to stop the gas getting into the air, to stop the leachate getting into the ground and to remove the waste so it can be properly treated. That will take time but there is an urgency in stopping the gas and leachate and that could be done quickly. The site should also be secured.

That is what the committee should recommend to the Minister and the EPA. The existing money, which is ring-fenced for environmental projects, should be used to remediate the situation at Kerdiffstown and the committee should recommend to the Minister the enhancement of the powers of the EPA so it can act immediately. If, after spending the money, the EPA still feels it can collect money from directors, I have no objections to their being pursued. I am not, however, prepared to wait to see if a trial and error approach of that nature is successful before action is taken.

Minister of State at the Department of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government (Deputy Áine Brady)

I thank Clean Air Naas for the comprehensive presentation today and for the time and energy the group has put into the project. These people all have other commitments so the time they have put into this is amazing. They are doing this because they care about their neighbours and families who must put up with this stench. They have outlined how far the stench stretches in the area beyond the dump. I live in Clane and there are times when I can smell it there. It is no exaggeration that this affects many people over a wide area.

The group pointed out that the priorities for the dump are to cap the leachate, to clean up the loose debris and to secure the site. The fire that broke out last week that has not yet been put out is also a serious issue. I heard today that the stench from the fire is absolutely appalling. An international expert must now come to see how the fire can be brought under control. That is another priority to add to the first three.

We are waiting for the EPA and I urge the agency to come up with the action plan it was supposed to have this week to deal with this issue and to give to the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government the money that is necessary for these initial steps. I urge the committee to put pressure on the new Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government. I met him earlier and asked him to get involved in this issue and speed up the remediation of the issue.

Deputy Bernard J. Durkan

I congratulate the Clean Air Naas group for making its case in this fashion. Its members have our sympathies, having suffered for so long with so little response from the statutory authority charged with responsibility for such an issue. I would have forgiven the group for losing hope and heart because we had the same problem. Some of us have voiced our concerns about the pollution threat from such sites, forcing oral hearings and appeals over the years but there was very little attention paid to the points we made despite the fact that it was clear to all of us that there was a distinct possibility of two things happening: mismanagement of the facility after planning permission was granted and the difficulty of controlling the dump if the will did not exist to control it.

Other speakers were completely right. This situation cannot continue; it is an environmental hazard. Those fires that cannot be extinguished can continue to burn for years. That is a serious problem. I too had occasion to visit five, six or seven years ago. It is a sad to see the situation has degenerated but it showed all the signs of going in that direction from the very beginning. That is really sad. The authorities with statutory responsibility in this area were made aware of the situation several years ago. Action should have been taken in the courts at that time, but that step was not taken. The longer a situation like this is left unchallenged, the greater the eventual cost for whoever has to carry responsibility for the costs. The impact on the environment and on the mental and physical health of people who live in the vicinity becomes more serious. I agree with Deputy Stagg that the funding that is available for that purpose should be utilised. We do not know how much will remain by the time a distinct action is taken to access the site. That is what the fund should be for.

Public representatives will not oppose measures to deal with this serious issue. I would like clarification on what was meant when the EPA referred to legal action. Is that legal action against the operators of the landfill site or is it legal action by creditors or by statutory authorities?

Mr. Brian McGeever

Let me clarify the position. The EPA has taken an action against the company to force the companies in question to clean up the site and rectify the position. Orders have been issued and I understand the EPA is now going to what it calls fallback orders to make the directors of the companies in question liable in the event that they do not get the work done.

Deputy Bernard J. Durkan

I would not have a great deal of confidence in coming to a satisfactory conclusion along those lines. We may need to look elsewhere to achieve it. The procedure was carried out under statutory supervision, so the negative impact on health and the environment that flows from that must be addressed under statutory supervision.

I apologise for not attending the public meeting organised by CAN six or seven weeks ago. Let me assure the witnesses that if I had received notice, I would have been more than delighted to attend because I have inspected that site on several occasions. When I saw it five or more years ago, it was like an unregulated moonscape.

Chairman

Before we conclude, I invite the witnesses to make their observations.

Ms Anne Fitzpatrick

I am Anne Fitzpatrick, the secretary of Clean Air Naas. I thank the Chairman and Deputy Fitzpatrick, as the other committee members are not here.

I have lived on Kerdiffstown Road for most of my life. My mother has been living there for almost 65 years and my father has been living there for the 46 years that he has been married. One November night two winters ago I found my mother crying in the kitchen. When I asked her what was up, her response was, "Anne, what did I do to deserve this?" She could no longer open the windows in her bedroom, or open the windows in any part of the house, we could not leave the front door open for too long for fear of the odours emanating from the site, the main entrance being located a half a mile down the road from my parents' home. When I left my family home that night I cried for her. I am pleading with the members of the joint committee to tell Oireachtas Members that we need their support in whatever form they can exercise their power because the Environmental Protection Agency, as the so-called "protector" of our environment told us to lock our windows and doors, and keep them closed because it did not know what emission was going into the houses. The EPA, a statutory organisation, has been vested with the care of our so-called "clean, green Ireland".

I ask the Chairman and plead with all members of the committee to take corrective steps to get immediate action taken to sort out this site.

Chairman

Do the witnesses wish to make observations or respond to particular comments? I know the members are supportive and well aware of the situation. I am from Portlaoise and for several years I have closed the air vents every time I pass that section of road. When I go to Naas to shop, I experience the odours. Far more people are aware of this problem than the witnesses might have expected.

Mr. Joe Friel

On numerous occasions certain politicians have told us that problems with landfill exist in half the countryside. There is a problem with landfill being smelly, it is the sheer scale of the problem that is causing such an impact. This dump is approximately 50 to 60 acres and contains 1.1 million tonnes of waste, if not more. It could be seen as similar to taking all the waste from Dublin and piling it up beside Naas town for three to five years while it is left to rot unprocessed. That is the scale of the problem and all the other issues follow from it. The only twisted bit of reassurance we have had from the EPA in recent times is that its expert report confirms that this waste is now liquifying and running back down a hill into a river and ending up in the glasses of water in Dublin. The problem has returned to the source of the waste and must be sorted.

The European Union will be imposing significant fines on the Government for polluting the most strategic water source in Ireland.

Chairman

Is anybody else offering?

Mr. Richard Gibbons

Chairman, if the pollution resulting from unprocessed waste increases at the current rate, it will kill somebody. It will be too late when more than one person is poisoned from the emission of low level gases into a low lying area. We must do something immediately to burn off the gas.

Chairman

I will bring this section of the meeting to a close. I thank the witnesses for attending. Members are well aware of the problem and have raised it with the committee in recent times. I thank all Deputies from the constituency for being present at the meeting and I am very pleased we proceeded, as some had thought we should cancel the meeting in view of the current situation.

We will raise this issue with the EPA whose representatives are due to come before us today.

Sitting suspended at 4.38 p.m. and resumed at 4.40 p.m.