Campaigners opposed to new Sowerby Bridge incinerator set to hold rally next month
Campaigners are opposing a waste company operating an incinerator at its site in the town
Campaigners opposing a waste company operating an incinerator at its Calderdale premises have organised a rally to keep the issue in the public eye.
Using the tagline “Permit approved – but the fight goes on”, campaigners have set Saturday, February 1, 2025, as the date for the rally at which people will be encouraged to sign a petition.
People are asked to meet at 11am at The Moorings pub at the Canal basin in Sowerby Bridge.
Publicised by the Benbow Group and on the Facebook page Say No To Waste Incineration in Ryburn Valley, they are urging supporters to: “Sign the petition – join in and make your voice heard!”
The rally comes quickly on the heels of a challenge potentially being made legally to challenge a controversial Calderdale Council decision over a key environmental permit.
Last November Calderdale Council granted Calder Valley Skip Hire (CVSH) a key environmental permit allowing the company to use a small waste incineration plant (SWIP) at its Belmont, Sowerby Bridge, premises, at the second time of asking.
A complicated history stretching back nearly 10 years has seen Calderdale Council refuse planning permission for the incinerator, and that decision being overturned on appeal to the planning inspectorate.
However, companies also have to have an environmental permit to run the incinerator, and following the company’s initial 2021 application objectors went to law and won the right to a judicial review of the council Cabinet’s decision to grant the permit.
After this the permit was quashed, following which the status of the permit application was deemed to be “undetermined” and the company appealed the non-determination.
But Planning Inspector John Woolcock, citing risk to health, dismissed this after an inquiry, effectively refusing it – however, as the law stands companies can lodge further applications, and a second was granted by the council late last year.
Last week the resident who set the legal ball rolling over the 2021 application, Malcolm Powell, sent Calderdale Council (copied to CVSH) a Judicial Review Pre-action Protocol Letter to challenge the grant of the latest environmental permit, to which the council has 14 days from January 16 to respond.