Council leader voices incinerator fears

The chairman of a Staffordshire Parish Council has stepped into the fray over controversial plans for an incinerator in South Staffordshire.

Councillor Jeff Ashley of Huntington Parish Council is also a councillor for Hatherton ward on South Staffordshire Council and has criticised the plans for a £122.4 million incinerator at Four Ashes Industrial Estate. He said: "As the prevailing winds are from the west the most outfall of pollution will be over Cannock and the Cannock Chase Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty.

"The long term effects could be catastrophic for the people, wildlife, flora and fauna."

The plant is designed to burn up to 300,000 tonnes of waste a year and with a chimney standing over 100 metres high, Councillor Ashley believes it "massively over-estimates the size of the facilities needed to deal with Staffordshire's non-recyclable waste".

He added: "While this colossal building would be on a business site it would dwarf all the other nearby buildings and, bearing in mind, the flat area overlooked by Cannock Chase Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty it will appear as a huge blot on the landscape."

Other concerns raised by Councillor Ashley, who asked South Staffordshire councillors in August to refer the plans back to Staffordshire County Council for reconsideration. include traffic from the extra lorries bringing waste from across the Midlands to the plant.

He said: "At no time have we advocated that Four Ashes may not be a suitable site for an incinerator, we are not into nimbyism, it is that the whole scheme being proposed is on too large a scale. A much smaller plant would not eliminate all the problems but the impact of each one would be greatly reduced."