Anglian Water officials were put on the spot by residents at the annual meeting of Fairfield Parish Council on Thursday May 4.
Head of Public affairs, Chris Hayton and Regional Technical Manager, Tim Blackmore, gave presentations as to the problems that have caused residents extreme discomfort from the smell emanating from the works.
When it was opened to the floor a resident said that he had lived on Fairfield for 10 years. Originally, there was no real problem but for over a year there was a major issue. “What had they done that changed the situation?” This point was also made by former MP Alistair Burt.
Both officers admitted that they did not know the answer. They then came under fire from another resident who is a consultant to the industry. He asked a series of questions which again the officials could not answer without reference.
FPC will look at those questions in detail at the meeting this Thursday (May 11) to consider our next step.
An extract from the list of questions raised are given here:
- What type of odour control system are you putting in?
- Are you enclosing all exposed odour sources to prevent untreated effluvia escaping to the atmosphere, if not why not?
- Why do you expect your installation will eliminate mal-odours from this site?
- What is your calculated odour load to atmosphere from the imported sludge?
- What is the total volume of raw mal-odorous sludge at Letchworth?
- What Levels of H²S are indicated by your boundary Sulphide Monitors, and can this data be produced for public access?
- Inspection of aerial photographs of the site appear to show surface activity at the northern end of the sludge lagoons. Are these lagoons being actively used? What was the last date that raw sludge was pumped into these lagoons?
Anglian Water’s newsletter outlining their proposals to solve the problem can be downloaded here.
A copy of the latest Abatement Notice issued by CBC can be downloaded here.
The specialist’s report employed by CBC, and referred to in our last post, can be downloaded here.
Last modified: May 8, 2017