Wicklow County Council has told the High Court it will cost between €3 million and €20 million to restore and make safe lands allegedly used for the illegal dumping of hospital and other waste.
The two acres of lands at Coolnamadra, Donard, are adjacent to a tributary of the Slaney river and in an area of natural beauty near the Glen of Imaal.
About 8,000 tonnes of material, including blood-stained bandages, used incontinence pads, bodily fluids, scalpels, needles, laboratory waste, gas cylinders and documents concerning patients and consultant doctors were illegally dumped on the lands, the council claimed.
The waste came from the Blackrock Private Clinic and the Mater public hospital.
The council has taken proceedings against Mr Clifford Fenton, the owner of the lands, and Swalcliffe Ltd, trading as Dublin Waste, its managing director, Mr Louis Moriarty, and his wife, Ms Eileen Moriarty.
It is seeking several orders, including orders requiring that the site be restored and made safe and to put in place an ongoing monitoring system.
It also wants orders directing the respondents to meet all of the costs incurred by the council arising from the management of the lands in question and the dumping of the waste.
Opening the case, Mr James Connolly SC, for the council, said that when Mr Fenton was first interviewed about the dumping, he indicated that it had stopped. However, it had subsequently been established that it was continuing.
To clear the site by incineration would cost up to €20 million, Mr Connolly said, while to carry out the necessary work by landfill would cost an estimated €3 million. Monitoring would also have to be put in place at an additional cost of about €20,000 a year.
He said evidence would be given by an environmental consultant, Mr Donal Ó Laoire, that the land was bounded by a field adjacent to a public road on one side and a tributary of the Slaney on the other side. The river was well stocked with freshwater fish and was a spawning ground for game fish.
Mr Ó Laoire's inspection of the land was carried out on October 22nd last year. He found hospital waste contained in tagged plastic bags on the surface of the landfill site with identifying numbers on them showing the origin. There was also construction, chemical, domestic and food waste and animal carcasses on the site.
Mr Connolly said Mr Fenton had made a statement in which he said he farmed 120 acres and in October 2001 he had agreed to the dumping at £90 a load. There were 11 truck loads dumped on his land, and at no stage was he aware that it was hazardous waste, Mr Fenton had said.
In its defence, Dublin Waste contends the hospitals should not have put the hazardous waste in the skips collected by the company. They had not told the company what was in the skip, it is claimed.
The respondents will also argue that a sub-contractor whom they hired to deliver the waste to a licensed dump had not done so and was fired because of this.
The case before Mr Justice O'Sullivan is expected to last several days.