Land Logical Ltd has been granted an environmental permit for a waste recovery operation at Stone Pit 1 in Dartford, Kent. The waste activity comprises the importation of approximately 490,000m3 of inert wastes to correct problems associated with differential settlement at this historic landfill site.
Prior to submission of the environmental permit application, a pre-application meeting was held with the local EA officers and PDE submitted a Waste Recovery Plan to the EA in accordance with RGN13. After considerable deliberation and internal consultation, the EA responded to say that they agreed with our assessment that the proposed activity is a waste recovery operation.
Landfill gas is extracted from the historic wastes and used to generate electricity or flared. The landfill gas extraction system had never been subject to an authorisation by the EA. However, following submission of the permit application for waste recovery, the EA required that the gas infrastructure be regulated under the new waste recovery permit and added to the application.
Whilst the gas infrastructure had been operating for over 20 years without incident the requirements for the application were as onerous as for a new operation and an H1 screen was produced for emissions to air followed by a quantitative assessment using the AERMOD dispersion model. A comprehensive Landfill Gas Management Plan was also developed for the site. The landfill gas infrastructure will require upgrading in accordance with current standards.
The planning application included noise conditions, with numerical limits and agreed mitigation measures. However, the determination period for the permit was protracted with the EA reassessing noise and the decisions made by the planning authority, effectively, they wished to re-consider the principal of the development. Whilst the noise assessment produced to support the planning application concluded that the risks from the proposed operation were acceptable, the EA requested that the baseline data be re-assessed based on BS4142. The data was reassessed and a new report produced which also concluded that the risks were acceptable. Ultimately the permit was issued with no bespoke noise conditions but with delays and additional costs to the Operator for re-assessing the previously submitted noise data.
PDE looks forward to continuing to work with Land Logical Limited with respect to their operations at Stone Pit 1.
