Waste incinerator plant approved despite concerns

The plant will be based at Belmont Industrial Estate on Rochdale Road

A waste incinerator plant will be built in Sowerby Bridge despite concerns raised by nearby residents.

Calder Valley Skip Ltd had a previous plan rejected by the council in 2017 and an appeal was dismissed by the government in 2023.

It has now been granted an environmental permit by Calderdale Council with conditions "to ensure that the plant will not have any detrimental effect on local residents, their amenity, or the wider environment".

Councillor Jane Scullion, leader of Calderdale Council, said: "We understand the strong local feeling around this permit application, and I know that this decision will be disappointing for the community."

She said it had been made clear there must be "absolute compliance" with the conditions attached to the permit.

"This will be robustly monitored by the council through a planned programme of inspections as well as continued air quality monitoring in the local area."

The plant will be based at Belmont Industrial Estate on Rochdale Road, despite a "large number of representations made on a wide range of issues during the three consultation periods".

The council's monitoring and compliance plan, which focuses on four key elements:

• Physical site inspection

• Scrutiny of the required monitoring data

• Continue air quality monitoring in the area

• The involvement of the local community to ensure concerns/issues are addressed.

People opposed to the decision lobbied councillors as they entered the meeting

Campaigners protested outside Halifax Town Hall as councillors arrived for a meeting of the full Calderdale Council on 27 November.

The decision to approve the permit was delegated to council officers, rather than councillors.

Councillor Martin Hey said: "Coming into the meeting, one woman said to me ‘I thought you would be against because all the councillors are against the incinerator, and yet you can't collectively stop it'.

"Something's going wrong, isn't it?" he said.

According to the Local Democracy Reporting Service, cabinet member for resources, Councillor Silvia Dacre said the decision was properly delegated to officers.

Campaigner Jane Pugh said "answers given at cabinet and council have not been very warm, almost antagonistic to reasonable questions".

Listen to highlights from West Yorkshire on BBC Sounds, catch up with the latest episode of Look North or tell us a story you think we should be covering here.