The Environment Agency is celebrating a successful prosecution against a recycling company which polluted the River Roding in Ongar.
Waste Recycling Group (Central) Limited pleaded guilty a breach of the Water Resources Act 1991 at Epping Magistrates Court and was fined £10,000 and ordered to pay the agency's legal costs of nearly £2,400.
The agency has called the result a huge success and said the cocktail of chemicals which leached into the river from the nearby landfill site run by the Waste Recycling Group could have caused serious environmental harm had it not been stopped quickly.
The pollution was spotted in June 2003 when an Environment Agency officer who was investigating another incident in the river and saw an orange coloured liquid in the water.
An investigation revealed leachate, the contaminated rainwater which collects at the bottom of all landfills, had escaped from the collection pit at the side of the landfill and into the Stondon Massey ditch which leads to the River Roding.
A spokesman for the Waste Recycling Group said: "We very much regret this offence occurred as it represents a departure from the high standards which the company aims to operate at all of its landfill sites.
"The company stresses that no harm to human health nor the environment resulted from the incident and the area of pollution was relatively small and the chemical constitution of the ditch and river rapidly returned to normal levels."
Tests showed the leachate was high in ammonia which is extremely poisonous to aquatic life but the leak did not cause any actual harm.
Published Wednesday May 26, 2004
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