Granville Woodhouse Landfill Information Page

Overview

Page created 26 March 2024. Last updated 12 April 2024.

We are sorry to hear that residents are experiencing problems with odour in the local area. Please be assured that we are working with the operator, Potters (Midlands) Ltd, to resolve these issues.

Thank you for visiting our information page. 

Background

Granville Woodhouse Landfill (also known as Redhill Landfill) has been operational at this location since 1991. The Environment Agency regulates the landfilling activities by way of an Environmental Permit. This permit contains conditions that control the operations carried out on site, ranging from the construction and design of a landfill cell; the types and volumes of waste that can be accepted; the emissions and their limits; and the frequency and type of environmental monitoring that is required.

Environmental Permit conditions are in place to ensure operations at the site are carried out in a way that prevents or minimises emissions and impacts on the environment, using appropriate management systems. The Environmental Permit allows the site to accept a wide range of non-hazardous and biodegradable wastes.

The local Planning Authority, Telford and Wrekin Council, gave approval for a landfill at this location. The planning permission restricts vehicle movements, operational hours, the area that can be infilled and the operational life of the site. It also requires the operator to comply with a previously agreed restoration plan to complete the landfill to a specific height and profile after it has been closed to accepting waste.

Granville Woodhouse Landfill is heavily engineered and formed from individual cells. Each cell is constructed with a clay and geomembrane liner to protect the ground around and below that cell. Once the cell is full of waste, it is then capped. Initially this is temporary capping using a layer of clay over the surface of the cell. This is to help prevent rainwater entering the waste, stop the waste inside being disturbed and to enable the gases being produced to be captured. When the cell is complete then permanent capping is installed. As with the base of the cell, the capping must be designed to an engineered standard.

Current situation

We recognise that odours coming from the landfill have escalated over the last few weeks. We have undertaken odour monitoring in your community to link it to the site and identify the likely actions needed to resolve this unacceptable situation.

We have required the operator to take action to improve gas and odour control on the landfill. We met the operator on 22 March 2024 to discuss plans to reduce odours from the site. The operator has now submitted this plan and we have approved it. This will have a positive effect on odour in the community.

The operator has sealed some of the gas infrastructure on the landfill during early April to help reduce odorous gas. The operator has also carried out a survey to identify other sources of odour across the landfill. Based on these findings, further mitigation measures will be installed by the operator, such as further sealing of infrastructure, increased cover of waste and capping on specific areas.

The operator has also drilled 6 new gas wells into the landfill site and connected them to the existing gas infrastructure to collect more landfill gas.

All these measures are being taken to minimise odour effects on the community.

The permanent sealing of waste (known as capping) is scheduled to begin on the 3 June 2024. This will cover more than 30,000m2 of waste and will allow the gas to be collected and used. This capping cannot be completed when conditions on the ground are too wet. The operator is reviewing its plans for the phasing of future areas to ensure large areas of the site are capped prior to the winter.

We will continue to monitor odours, track progress against the agreed plan and review the operator's management plans to ensure it is working in accordance with its permit.

Incident reporting

Please continue to report any issues linked to this site, such as odour, to our 24-hour incident hotline on 0800 80 70 60. Your reports help build a picture of the issue, inform our investigation and allow us to feedback to the permitted site the effect any measures being implemented are having. It is important that you report any odour issues you are experiencing. 

When reporting odour incidents to us, we will ask you to assess the strength of the odour on a scale of 0 to 6. To help with your assessment, an explanation of this scale is as follows: 

0 – No odour 

1 – Very faint odour (need to inhale into the wind to smell anything) 

2 – Faint odour (you can detect an odour when you inhale normally) 

3 – Distinct odour (there is clearly an odour in the air as you leave your car or enter the area) 

4 – Strong odour (a bearable odour but strong, you could stay in the area for some time) 

5 – Very strong odour (unpleasantly strong, you will want to leave the area quickly) 

6 – Extremely strong odour (likely to cause nausea and a strong need to remove yourself from the odour immediately) 

No landfill will ever be completely odour free. However, the level and type of odour from such operations should not be causing offence. The permit conditions require an Environment Agency officer to make a judgement about whether an odour is offensive. We can only take enforcement action where it is deemed offensive and the operator is not using all appropriate measures.

Health concerns

If residents have any health concerns, we advise them to contact NHS 111 as we are unable to provide health advice. 

Future updates

We will continue to keep you updated through this information page. We will next update this page by mid-May 2024. If there are any significant changes we need to make you aware of before this date, we will update this page sooner.

Frequently asked questions

We have included below the answers to some commonly asked questions about landfill sites. We hope you find these useful.

Useful links

How the Environment Agency regulate permitted facilities: Waste operations and installations: assessing and scoring environmental permit compliance - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)  

Telford and Wrekin Council website - frequently asked questions: https://www.telford.gov.uk/info/21927/landfill_sites/6700/granville_landfill_site_redhill

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