Welcome to The Cherry Tree Pig Farm Information Page

Overview

Welcome to community briefing page for Cherry Tree Pig Farm.

Permit Number – UP3936RL

Cherry Tree Farm, Stow Bedon, Attleborough, Norfolk, NR17 1BY has a permit from the Environment Agency (EA) under the Environment Permitting Regulations (EPR) 2016 for the rearing of production pigs. As the primary regulator of the farm, we publish this page to share information about the regulated operations on site and to outline some of our activities to keep the public informed. We will aim to provide updates monthly, subject to review.

Our Responsibilities

We are responsible for setting the permit conditions for the site and making sure that permit holders comply with them. We conduct unannounced periodic audits and inspections to check that the operators are complying with their permit conditions. We investigate complaints of amenity (e.g. odour and noise) and make sure the operator is taking appropriate measures to prevent or minimise any impacts offsite. If a breach of permit conditions is identified, we will investigate and take appropriate enforcement action; this action can range from advice and guidance through to prosecution for serious offences.

The Site

Cherry Tree farm has been a pig farm for at least 30 years. It was originally an under threshold/unpermitted sow unit. The original permit was issued January 2017 for 6990 pigs to be housed in a mixture of the old existing buildings and new buildings. This was then varied in 2018 to its current permit. The ten old buildings were replaced with seven new, ‘’Best Available Techniques’’ (BAT) compliant buildings. The ventilation was changed from naturally ventilated to mechanically ventilated, using high velocity roof fans designed to achieve an efflux velocity of 10m/sec. The site was fully stocked and operational early June 2021. The site is a straw-based system, with daily removal of manure from the buildings through a series of gable end roller doors. The pig manure is temporarily stored on site in an enclosed muck store. During the daily mucking out, the manure is removed off-site at the end of the process during the week (i.e. no muck is stored on site overnight).

Current Situation

The first EA compliance inspection of the site was in July 2021. Following the inspection, we requested further information regarding the operation and technical details of the ventilation system and house design as it differed from the information provided by the operator in their permit application and the basis on which the permit was issued.

We issued an enforcement notice last year due to breaches of permit at the site in relation to odour and emission points to air. As a result, the operator has now made infrastructural and operational improvements on the site to further minimise odours off-site.

We are in regular contact with the site operator regarding any complaints made by residents and continue to carry odour assessments in the area and inspect the site, and where possible, will seeking improvements to site activities that will help to further minimise odours off-site.

National Incident Recording System (NIRS)

The National Incident Recording System is a Hotline telephone number, where members of the public can report an incident to the EA. So far we have had 476 reports recorded through our 24-hour incident hotline number: 0800 807060. Most of these reports are odour related.

Compliance Inspections: We have been assessing the odour from the site over the last few years and officers have carried out eight full compliance inspections and over 40 odour assessments in the area. Assessments have been carried out by at least eight different officers, so a range of sensitivities to smell have been represented.  Whilst we sometimes detect malodours from the site on its boundary with the public footpath, we have only confirmed strong odours in the grounds of the nearest residential property on a few occasions. The operator has breached its odour permit condition on three occasions since the site became operational and has had to review and update its odour management plan.

Odour: We started receiving odour complaints about the site approximately one month after it started operating. When we have detected odour, it is usually attributed to the morning mucking out of the buildings or to the manure store. The operator has found to have breached their odour permit condition on four occasions for not following the appropriate measures in their Odour Management Plan. This required them to review their plan and implement additional measures to minimise odour from site.

What have we done?

• Regular assessments of odour to confirm the extent, severity, and source of the odours.
• Regular inspections of the Farm to assess the sources and underlying causes of the odour and to monitor actions being taken by the operator to address the issue.
• Issued an EPR Enforcement Notice on the operator for breaches of permit at the site in relation to odour and emission points to air requiring the operator to make infrastructural and operational improvements on the site to further minimise odours off-site.
• Regular liaison with the site operator. This includes assessing any improvements they are implementing.

Findings from all inspections are detailed within our Compliance Assessment Report Forms (CAR). We use our guidance on assessing and scoring environmental permit compliance to score permit breaches in accordance with our Compliance Classification Scheme (CCS).

What has the Operator done?

Following the issue of an enforcement notice by us last year in relation to breaches of permit at the site in relation to odour and emission points to air, the operator has now made infrastructural and operational improvements on the site to further minimise odours off-site, including installing higher chimney stacks to the ventilation system, enclosing the roofed manure store on three sides and replacing all the gable end screen doors on the rearing sheds with solid material. They have also made the following operational changes: removal off-site during the week of the manure from the store and not spreading any manures or slurry on farmland in the vicinity of the site/local properties.

Following complaints, the operator provides us with updates to us on the actions they are taking on site to prevent, or where that is not practicable, to minimise the risk of off-site odours.

In response to concerns raised by residents that there was a haze or plume seen around the chimney stacks on the buildings, the operator commissioned an assessment of the air flow velocity on a sub-sample of the chimney stack fans on the buildings by a third-party contractor. The assessment showed that speeds in excess of the required 10m/sec for effective air dispersal were achieved. 

Reporting.  

Please use our numerical intensity of the odour categories:

0 - No odour 

1 - Very faint odour - (barely detectable)

2 - Faint odour - (detectable, but not obviously noticeable)

3 - Distinct odour - (easily detected and noticeable while walking and breathing normally)

4 - Strong odour - (bearable odour, but will remain on my hair and clothes)

5 - Very strong odour - (you would want to vacate the location)

6 - Extremely strong odour - (you would want to hold your breath and vacate the area)

What happens when you report a problem? We log all calls even though we may not be able to send an officer out to the site. Reports are passed to the operator to start investigations; personal data is never supplied on these reports. Depending on the circumstances we will also attend to assess the odour and identify any potential sources. Whilst we cannot look at all reports immediately, prompt reporting ensures that we are able to target our site visits appropriately and provides us the best chance of identifying any potential source and associated actions. Your reports provide valuable data on the nature and scale of the problem, and we appreciate the effort you take in passing them to us.