Plans have been submitted to extend the hours of operation at a Carlisle waste management facility.
If approved it would mean a 24-hour operation, Monday to Friday, at Hespin Wood Waste Management Park near Rockcliffe.
Cumbria Waste Management has applied to Cumberland Council to vary a condition which was attached to planning permission when it was originally granted for the site.
Currently the hours of operation run between 7am to 7pm, seven days a week, and the application will be decided by councillors tomorrow because of local objections.
A report to the planning committee says: “Hespin Wood has been subject of several high-profile recent planning application which have resulted in numerous objections being raised on the suitability of the site as a waste management facility.
“This recent proposal has resulted in seven representations being received objecting to the proposal on material planning grounds, therefore it needs to be determined by the planning committee.
“Allowing 24-hour processing of material reduces the turnaround time of waste material being on site. Currently turnaround time is around 72 hours from the material entering Hespin Wood to be sorted, bailed and ready for redistribution.
“Twenty-four-hour working would significantly reduce that timescale when waste is on site. This in turn would reduce environmental impacts such as odour, vermin etc.”
The council has received an objection from Rockcliffe Parish Council.
It said: “The parish council object to these proposed operating hours extension.
“We wish to reiterate objections already made on previous planning applications; our concerns have not changed, conversely, they have increased.
“The parish council is aware that this application is inextricably linked to the planned incinerator proposal already tabled.
“The application needs to be considered as part of that proposal and not as a single entity, indeed, the proposal should also be considered with the imminent Pyrolysis plant at North West Recycling.
“It is our opinion that waste processed in north Cumbria should not affect the hierarchy of recycling; the RDF plant does not address the necessity to reduce plastic waste, it merely provides a source of revenue for Cumbria Waste Management Limited which is a conflict of interest considering the council’s relationship with that company.
“It is also our opinion that the RDF facility will increase the number of HGVs in our parish with the potential to bring waste from outside of the Cumberland
catchment area.
“This is not sustainable and the parish of Rockcliffe cannot endorse a plan to bring more waste than is absolutely necessary into the Hespin Wood site.
“Originally Hespin Wood was a landfill operation only, with a limited lifespan – that lifespan is extended now until 2039 where upon it is our belief that the site will close and be returned to nature.
“In recent years that landfill operation has morphed into a small industrial estate; this is not what was sold to the parish council at the time of concept.
“The small ‘incentives’ that came with tolerating the incessant littering of the hedgerows, the rumbling of garden waste macerators, the smell of rotting vegetation, the beep beep, beep of reversing wagons, the opportunistic fly-tippers dumping tyres and asbestos adjacent to the site have long eroded.
“Have you seen the state of the nature walk recently that was sold to the PC as an environmental benefit? Just look at the entrance to the walk; the gate, the fence are all beyond repair – the walk long since maintained.
“The parish council cannot risk ratifying any part of the Hespin Wood site that risks extending beyond 2039.”
Tomorrow’s meeting is due to start at 10.30am.
