Planners agree to meetingto discuss Bioenergy plant

Irish-owned Stream Bioenergy Ltd is aiming to build an Anaerobic Digestion (AD) plant that would generate electricity from poultry litter.

Last week the Ballymena Times revealed that local residents were opposed to this application with concerns over safety, noise and smell the key issues.

Many of the local residents attended last Thursday night’s Planning Committee of Ballymena Council, with the application set for approval by planners.

A presentation was made by council’s Environmental Health Officer Sam Mills at the committee, outlining the proposal and the processes involved.

With concerns from residents over noise and smell, Mr Mills explained that the application had to meet with guidelines before being approved.

Regarding noise, he said the applicant hopes to operate at 27 decibels, which means that the aim is that at the nearest dwelling to the site you shouldn’t be able to hear any noise.

Councillors heard that the facility is also going to be near “100% leak proof” to prevent any smells.

Mr Mills added: “The odour target is that you should not be able to smell odour at the closest sensitive building; should not be detectable at any development within 800m.”

Emissions from the plant will be air monitored as per licensing by the Northern Ireland Environment Agency.

For the plant to have a Waste Management Licence then it must operate with the NIEA’s guidelines.

Councillor Roy Gillespie had been speaking to the concerned residents and he said they were still concerned about noise and air pollution from proposed site.

Mr Mills added: “Any odour will take place inside a closed place. The building is designed to be leak proof. There will air suction and all goes into an air treatment facility.

“There should not be a smell, according to their predictions, if there is a smell then they will have to put in place odour management- a corrective procedure.”

Councillor Declan O’Loan said that this application was very important but residents must be able to ask serious questions: “This is a very, very important application. The problem of chicken litter has to be solved, may be the answer to the problem and maybe all the concerns can be addressed.”

Chair of the meeting Councillor Hubert Nicholl warned that an application of this significance needed to be dealt with efficiently.

“Any delays on this may lead to the loss of it completely,” he said.

It was suggested that rather than holding an office meeting with a councillor and planning officer, a large meeting should take place between concerned residents, councillors and any MLAs.

Then at the end of this meeting, and if the concerns are addressed, with planners still satisfied, then they could approve it, instead of it coming back before the council.

After a short discussion with residents, members agreed to take this course of action with the meeting set to take place within the next two weeks.