`Green' waste treatment plant gets licence

The State's first "green" hazardous waste treatment plant has been licensed by the Environmental Protection Agency.

The new facility, which has been developed at a cost of £3 million over the past three years, has the capacity to process 36,000 tonnes of hazardous waste per annum in what is claimed to be a "completely sustainable" manner.

The hazardous wastes treated at the Sheriff Street plant in Dublin include oils, waste water, coolants and hydrocarbons. All processes at the facility are based on recycling activities with more than one million litres of oil recovered and recycled at the facility annually.

While there are already oil recycling plants in Northern Ireland, this is the first facility in Ireland to handle hydrocarbons.

It has been developed by Pipe and Drain Services, part of the Green Sunrise Group. Green Sunrise operates a range of industrial waste treatment facilities concentrating on recovery and recycling. The group employs 142 people.

In May of this year the Green Party MEP Ms Nuala Ahern opened the company's cleaning facility for returnable packaging at Leixlip in Co Kildare.

The company uses a number of oil-handling vehicles to remove oil spillages and sludges from industrial units around the State and transports the waste to its facility at Sheriff Street.

The oils and solids are then separated from the water which is purified and monitored by Dublin Corporation before being pumped into the Liffey. The oils and solids are recycled. According to the company the facility was perfected to ensure "zero impact on the environment" although the purified water being discharged from Sheriff Street should actually improve the overall water quality in the Liffey.

Mr Padraig Duggan, operations director with Pipe and Drain Services, said that as the industrial sector expands, the pressure to find a solution to industrial waste also grows. "Our facility is now licensed by the Environmental Protection Agency and is in a position to make a major contribution to sustainable development."

Describing the facility as "state-of-the-art", the Minister for the Environment, Mr Dempsey, said there was "clearly scope for greater participation by the private sector in the provision of waste management services and infrastructure".

He added that the proposed national hazardous waste management plan identifies many wastes suitable for recycling.