London - Activists from the environment group Greenpeace yesterday shut down Britain's largest waste incinerator.
Mr Steve Brown, operations manager for Londonwaste Ltd, said that the plant in Edmonton, north London, was closed after deliveries of refuse were blocked by a team of six demonstrators who broke in early yesterday morning and partially closed off one of the plant's two 100-metre-high exhaust chimneys.
The action comes just two weeks after Greenpeace members were invited to tour the plant and see the incinerator in action.
Speaking from the top of the chimney, campaigner Mr Rob Gueterbock said: "We have now capped half of the chimney. We have got a metal device in which we slide in planks to progressively cap it in a safe and controlled way.
"We've gone a long way to stopping this toxic cocktail spewing out of the chimney. We're stopping the amounts of arsenic and acid gases, which is definitely good news for north London. These incinerators are little more than cancer factories."