How aware are you of Britaniacrest’s plans to build a Mass Burn Incinerator in North Horsham and adjacent to the proposed major North Horsham development of 2,750 homes, and schools?

These plans were announced to the public just 24 hours before a local exhibition which no doubt was intended to comply with mandatory consultation, but with such minimal notice the timing has to be questionable, to say the least.

Britaniacrest refer to their proposals in ‘tech-speak’ as a Recycling, Recovery and Renewable Energy [3Rs] Facility, whereas it is a MASS BURN INCINERATOR, and just that, and as such creates gaseous emissions. Mass burn is not recycling – it destroys by fire!
The scale of the building to house this incinerator is a massive 175 ft high, with a chimney of 300 ft and this would make it visible from many distances.

During the ‘noughtees’ many Horsham residents campaigned against a proposed incinerator and won the day with West Sussex Count Council stating publicly that they were against incineration, and chose the plant that currently resides at the Warnham brickworks site, and operated by Biffa, where waste goes through a sorting and recycle process [MBT/AD technology]. A condition of this facility is that it only accepts almost all its feedstock from West Sussex, not East Sussex, Surrey etc.

Horsham already handles all of West Sussex’s municipal waste [waste that goes into the smaller bin and collected weekly], some 240,000 tonnes pa [through the Biffa facility] and surely Horsham has done its bit.

The proposed Britaniacrest plant would draw in other waste streams from wherever it made commercial sense [ie profitable to them]. This waste proposal is not for West Sussex – so just why should Horsham be burdened? Do we really accept even more HGV trucks on local roads, and the blight of incineration?

These proposals are scheduled to be submitted to WSCC soon as a planning application, so it is already timely to make your own views known to your representatives on parish, district and county councils and even our MP, before it is too late. Once built it would be there ‘forever’.

Brian Johnson
Langhurstwood Road, Horsham

source: http://www.wscountytimes.co.uk/news/your-say/letter-the-blight-of-incineration-1-7627087