Chemical processing plant will process greater volume in Liverpool than caused one of biggest non-nuclear explosions history
Residents have begun their fight against a plan to process at least 56,000 tonnes a year of toxic and highly hazardous chemical waste next to homes in south Liverpool.
Garston and Grassendale residents have engaged lawyers in their bid to stop a dangerous facility that threatens whole of South Liverpool. Liverpool City Council’s Planning Committee has granted permission for a controversial hazardous waste facility to process the same chemicals that caused the 1974 Flixborough disaster, which caused one of the biggest non-nuclear explosions in history.
The plans, by waste giant Veolia UK, would result in a massive expansion of the volume of highly toxic and explosive waste being processed at the facility in King St, Garston, only metres from established residential communities and 200m from a primary school.
The chemicals processed are the same – but in far larger quantities – as those involved in the infamous 1974 explosion in rural Flixborough, which killed 28 people and damaged buildings three miles away, and would have killed far more had the disaster not happened on a weekend night. A key recommendation of the inquiry into the Flixborough disaster was not to build such facilities near residential areas.
A previously approved scheme of 28,000 tonnes along with the recent plans for a further 28,000 tonnes will total 56,000 tonnes a year when both plants are operational to process solvent recovery – with a large amount of this chemical waste imported from abroad. Campaigners believe these plans contravene the National Planning Policy Framework, which requires ministerial oversight for volumes of 30,000 tonnes or more. Ultimately the site would process as much as 96,000 tonnes a year, according to campaigners.
Spokesperson for the Garston United community group, Gary Woollam said:
We are deeply concerned about the impact of this massive intensification of a hazardous waste processing activity in the heart of our community. Amongst the materials being processed on this site is Cyclohexanone, the chemical responsible for the tragic 1974 Flixborough disaster.
Cyclohexanone is only one of the cocktail of hazardous and highly flammable chemicals that are processed by Veolia in Garston along with Isopropanol, Ethanol and Methanol. Concerns about the potential risks and health impacts of
the proposed facility have now spread to other nearby communities, with residents in the Grassendale & Cressington area opposing the plans and pledging to support a legal challenge.
Local activist and campaigner Sylvia McCleod said:
Residents across the area are angry at the way that the applicant and the city council have failed to engage with and consult the community. It looks like they were trying to get this through under the radar with minimum objections and minimum scrutiny. It is absolutely outrageous that Veolia’s first application was approved under delegated powers without it even being considered by Councillors.
Residents from local communities have come together to form the L19 Action Group, and have already secured funds to instruct a leading UK environmental and planning law firm, Richard Buxton Solicitors. They believe that evidence that the Council failed to adequately consult on the application, or subject it to the required level of environmental scrutiny, form the basis of a successful legal challenge.
Skwawkbox editor Steve Walker, who lives locally, said:
The most astonishing thing about the council’s planning meeting, which seemed
to reach a foregone conclusion of approving the scheme, is that there was no
discussion at all about the explosive risk. Flixborough’s blast radius was
three miles and they said not to build such plants near people. With the far larger
quantities they want to process in Garston, at least the whole south of the city
will be in danger, as well as the risk of the wind carrying leaked toxins for miles
further.”
A large explosion last November at a similar chemical recycling plant in Shepherd, Texas, led to police imposing a five-mile ‘shelter in place’ order because of the ‘acute toxicity’ of substances it released into the air.
Campaigners have already covered the first tranche of legal costs and have launched a crowdfund to help cover further expenditure.
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Shall we twin South Liverpool with East Palestine, Ohio now and have done with it?!
I’m in this radius, yet far from Garston. Not good.
We lived 8 miles from Flixborough when it exploded, and we thought it was a massive explosion at the steelworks, 1 mile away. Flixborough village looked like a war zone! The cause was a simple “work round” for a leaking pipe – the sort of error that comes with chasing time and profits.
Flixbough is 17 miles sw of Hull and debris from the Flixborough explosion fell on Hull.
Hot liquid cyclohexane is a very volatile chemical and SW’s point about LCC’s planning committee failing to involve the local community in addressing the explosive risks is a serious failing.
Veolia is obviously greenwashing the issue, LCC something much worse. Starmer’s Labour has become a willing accomplice to ANY (and every?) corporate cause.
Useful, fairly detailed study of the Flixborough Disaster here: https://www.aria.developpement-durable.gouv.fr/wp-content/files_mf/FD_5611_flixborough_1974_ang.pdf
“The property damage caused by the explosion covered a vast zone:
– all buildings lying within a radius of 600 meters around the explosion epicentre were destroyed;
– a total of 1,820 housing units and 167 retail businesses in the vicinity were damaged to varying degrees, this
disastrous consequence concerned 72 of the 79 houses in Flixborough, 73 of the 77 homes in Amscott and
644 of 756 in Burton;
– missile-like debris projection due to the explosion was considerable: a large piece of equipment would be
found 6 km from the plant and smaller debris could be found as far as Anlaby, 32 km away.”
Converting those figures into percentages we get:
– Just over 91% of the houses in Flixborough were damaged;
– 94.8% of the houses in Amscott were damaged;
– Just over 85% of houses in Burton were damaged.
It would be useful to translate those percentages into the number of housing units likely to be within a similar blast radius of the Liverpool plant.
Then engage solicitors to officially advise all decision makers in writing who are involved in this travesty that they will be held personally responsible by those adversely affected for the costs of any damages, deaths and injuries arising from any incidents.