Closure of Inagh dump to be recommended at council

MEMBERS of the Environmental and Water Services Strategic Policy Committee are to recommend the closure of the landfill service at Ballyduffbeg Waste Management facility in Inagh at the October Clare County Council meeting.
Members of the SPC met on Monday where they held a discussion about the future operation and management of the central waste management facility in Inagh, arising from a report which outlined the facility is operating at a significant loss.
Chairman of the SPC, Councillor Joe Arkins explained to the members that Clare has an overcapacity for landfill and the county is going to go the same way as the ghost estates if it did not rectify the situation.
“We will end up with ghost landfill sites. We can cater for 230,000 tonnes of landfill waste in the county per annum. The need that is expected by the year 2015 is 75,000 tonnes,” he outlined.
He told the members it is now a case of the council deciding whether to pause the landfill waste intake or to close the facility to landfill.
Addressing the concerns of members, senior executive engineer Paul Moroney explained that since 2008, the intake and revenue from the Ballyduffbeg site “has fallen significantly and it is recommended that phase four would not proceed”.
“We are currently in phase three and we have about a quarter capacity left in that phase. It is proposed that that would be filled, which would take until the end of 2011 to fill. Landfill is decreasing in volume and it will continue to decrease and given that there is over capacity of landfill in the region, we expect the gate fees will be reduced as well,” he said.
He added that it did not seem viable to proceed to phase four, which would cost €4m.
“Our options are to lease or to sell it. In the current market, I don’t think any of these options are viable but I would recommend that we keep them under review. If we close the gate to landfill waste when phase three is filled, it will take us up to the end of 2011. It will not affect the civic amenities on site or the recycling. It will operate similar to the facilities at Scariff and Lisdeen,” Mr Moroney added.
He stressed that the council would look at expanding the facilities at Ballyduffbeg to cater for other types of waste disposal such as brown composting and providing biomass facilities. He explained that the current service offers green composting but that brown composting essentially offers more specialised processing where for instance the matter has been contaminated by food. He highlighted that the closure of the landfill would not mean the removal of all services and that the council would be investigating rolling out more services at the site into the future. 
Speaking at the meeting, Shannon Town Councillor Cathy McCafferty said she felt it was “wrong to open this facility” and sought for those responsible for making this decision to be held to account.
The SPC is to put their recommendation for the cessation of the commercial landfill operation at Ballyduffbeg by putting a cap on the development of the landfill facility once phase three is completed. As part of their discussion, it was proposed that front-line staff would be redeployed to other duties.
The SPC also recommends the civic amenities on site continue and that the council apply to the Environmental Protection Agency for the appropriate licence thereafter to accept a small quantity of wet waste. It also proposes that the site undergoes regular and ongoing remediation and monitoring to ensure that local residents are not adversely affected.
Their recommendations are due to be put to the members of Clare County Council at the October meeting of the local authority.