Monklands Residents

 Against Pyrolysis Plant 

(MRAPP)

What you can do

·        Contact us to volunteer your help

·        Read further details or join us by Social Networking e.g. Beebo, Facebook

·        USE OUR TEMPLATE LETTER (pointer below) to send to the Planning department.
The number delivered so far to the planning department is 5,500+.

·        Please leave your comments on the planning proposal for the incinerator on the North Lanarkshire Council Planning Committee website Click HERE).

·        Also, please email or write to all your local councillors and the councillors on the planning committee (on the right hand column) and lodge your objection. If enough of us object we can stop this ruining Monklands

·        Click here to find your Councillor’s email and surgery times

·        Important Dates

 o   the planning meeting date had been confirmed as Wed 27 Jan - I believe this will be held in the Motherwell Civic Centre

Why we’re against the Proposal

(North Lanarkshire Council has received an application by a private company – Shore Energy (of Perth) to build a Waste-to-Energy Pyrolysis (Incinerator) Plant in Monklands.  The proposed plant at the former Shanks & McEwan site will run 24/7 and the waste processed there will be pulled from all over West and Central Scotland – as far up as Argyll and Bute and over to North and East Ayrshire – a 30 mile radius. Monklands is already well served by waste plant in Bargeddie and the recently approved Greengairs site.   Sikeside, Greenend, Shawhead and Carnbroe Residents &Tenants Groups have joined forces to oppose this plant and have managed to secure over 4000 individual supporters from all over Monklands – people who live, work, who have children at the nearby local schools, who worship, have businesses here, or are concerned about their relatives in these areas. And remember for home owners, what is something that risks Health, Safety, Odours and Wildlife going to do to House Prices?

WHY MONKLANDS IS OBJECTING:

There are many reasons to object to this, HEALTH – nano particles/dioxins and furans will be emitted from this plant – Shore claim that these will be filtered out, but they cannot filter out the finest particles which, once inhaled, cannot be exhaled.  Cumulatively this could cause serious ill health.  As we keep being told, Monklands has many health problems and in Lanarkshire there is a 41.3% higher rate of hospital admission for Chronic Pulmonary Disease (COPD) than the UK average.  Asthma rates in our area are also recognised as unacceptably high.  Should we risk having this plant in Monklands?  Experts know the dioxins are proven to contribute to infant mortality, birth defects, cancer, lung problems and an increase in asthma to name but a few.  FACT - the fly ash from the end product is more toxic than the original waste!  There is no SAFE LEVEL of dioxins, regulations only refer to ‘TOLERABLE’ and ‘ACCEPTABLE’ levels – see the you tube videos.

The safety record from even the most modern of these plants is not comforting.  The waste-to-energy plant in Dundee built in 2000 was meant to be state-of-the-art with regard to safety.  The reality is, it’s safety record has been abysmal.  For example  last year it was 3 times over the legal limit for dioxins, known for a fact to cause cancer, lung problems and other serious health problems.   Public money has had to be pumped into keep it going as there is no other waste disposal option for the council.

PROXIMITY – under waste regulations, this application does not meet the proximity rules – it is not a local solution to transport waste from a 30 mile radius. This will make a Toxic triangle around Monklands – the operator at Greengairs has objected to this proposal as it will take away their business! It may solve 14 other local authorities’ waste problems but will create problems for those living, working, at school or visiting our area.  For our part, proximity relates to how near it is to St. Bernard’s Primary, Shawhead Primary & Nursery, St. Stephens and Sikeside Primary & Nursery, Carnbroe Primary and several other nurseries, playgroups and homes.

TRAFFIC – we all appreciate how notoriously bad Shawhead is for traffic, with the increase in traffic proposed at this site, not only will safety on this road be diminished but exhaust emissions will increase with the proposed 100+ trucks per day, thereby adding to the already high pollution problem.  This area is already identified as having poor air quality.

SAFETY – fires in waste plants are not uncommon (‘Google’ waste plant fires UK and see how many ‘hits’ you get) – a massive fire at the present tyre shredding plant on this site caused major disruption to homes, transport and businesses in the area, causing road closures, burning for many days and tying up already stretched emergency services.  At Shore’s presentation in May of this year they didn’t reveal there was a major fire at the Orchid plant in Liverpool, despite being asked directly ‘what problems have occurred in the demonstration plant in Liverpool?’

WASTE MINIMISATION/ RECYCLING – this type of operation does not promote reduce, re-use or recycle. The term Pyrolysis is used instead of incineration as it’s a marketing ploy designed to convince people that it’s far away from the old style incineration.  In fact, the carbon footprint and output of plants such as the proposed plant is only marginally better and it’s not the solution to reducing landfill.  And 12% of the output of this plant will be going to landfill! It is not GREEN or CLEAN or a recycle plant if it involves incineration.  This proposal flies in the face of the Scottish Government's zero waste strategy and is a waste of resources.  Also it isn’t local if it is processing residual waste from a 30 mile radius (and potentially further using the adjacent rail line - it could be importing waste from the whole of the UK and beyond)

ODOURS - Shore say there will be no odours, despite complaints from residents near the Orchid Plant in Liverpool.  Trucks will be arriving and departing continually with thousands of tons of domestic, industrial, commercial, institutional, construction and biomass waste.

NOISE – from reversing vehicles morning till night 6 days per week and machinery 24/7 due to site operations.

WILDLIFE AND ECOLOGY – this area is well known as a habitat for kingfishers, badgers, otters, bats, deer, water voles, owls, foxes and buzzards – some of this wildlife is protected and will be disturbed and even potentially harmed in the clearance for this site initially and the subsequent lack of cover thereafter. The River Calder has improved over the years and now contains trout – the plan to expel waste water into the Calder diminishes any progress made in cleaning up our environment. The only wildlife in this area will be rats, encouraged by the food waste arriving from restaurants, hospitals, prisons, schools, fast food outlets etc.

TECHNOLOGY - This is relatively new technology the long term effects of which have yet to be determined.  Where is Simon Howie’s proven expertise in this field?  His previous waste experience was to set up waste contracts then sell the company on (to Viridor).  We are asked continually to take steps to reduce our ‘carbon footprint’ – what is the lifetime carbon footprint for this plant?

ECONOMICS - It is more expensive to create electricity this way than other methods. It is cheaper to recycle than make from scratch. The money it will cost to build would be much better spent on a recycling plant using Anaerobic Digestion. The profits from Pyrolysis (incineration) will go to shareholders not the local community.  And think how much all households have changed their rubbish behaviours in the last 5 years! To pay for the plant the councils will enter into contracts (with our money) for 10-20 years: will the nature of residual waste be the same for all that period? And how can the councils enter into contracts to use this plant without going through the proper EU procurement procedure?

Consider:  How will this affect existing council jobs within waste in NLC? Will these jobs be replaced by minimum wage jobs by Shore Energy?

Consider:  How will this affect your council tax longer term?  Shore Energy will have our councils locked in to deals which will not lower our council tax, should we prepare for increases in our taxes to supplement their profits?

For those who claim NIMBY- ism is our motivation, consider that Monklands residents are already suffering in the economic downturn, many people’s pensions are centred around the homes they are working very hard to keep.   The image of the Monklands that people have fought so hard to improve will be destroyed if this plant goes ahead.

We have provided links to useful information should you wish to delve deeper. Please do not sit back and hope it'll all go away or think there's nothing you can do about it.