A FORMER director of a waste management company who is being pursued personally by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) over the state of a dump in Co Kildare previously worked as a senior inspector with the agency.
The EPA confirmed that Dr Thady (otherwise Ted) Nealon had worked for it from 1997 to 2002, when he took a career break. He resigned in July 2003 and joined A1 Waste.
“While working for the EPA, he was a senior inspector involved in waste licensing,” the agency said. “In that role, he would have been involved in the assessment of many licence applications submitted to the EPA under the Waste Management Act.”
The EPA said this “included the assessment of a waste licence application by Neiphin Trading Ltd for a waste facility at Kerdiffstown, Co Kildare, which was still under assessment at the time of his departure on career break.
“A proposed licence was agreed by the EPA on 11 October 2002, as recommended by an inspector other than Dr Nealon. A final licence was issued on 16th July 2003. The EPA became aware of Dr Nealon having joined A1 Waste in September 2003.”
Dr Nealon said yesterday that he had set up his own environmental consultancy in 2002, while on his career break from the agency, and A1 Waste (trading as Dean Waste) had “evolved to become my biggest client”.
He said he had become a director of the company in 2008 and “did affidavits on its behalf” in relation to High Court cases taken by the EPA.
“I resigned as a director in July 2009, so I’m out of the picture now,” he said.
A1 Waste is associated with Neiphin Trading Ltd, operators of the Kerdiffstown dump near Naas, which is the subject of High Court proceedings taken by the EPA.
A court order prevents further waste being brought onto the Kerdiffstown site.
The dump, which was closed on foot of a High Court order last May, represents a major environmental hazard because of toxic substances and explosive gases escaping from it, according to a report commissioned by the agency.
The report, which was prepared for the guidance of potential bidders for the Kerdiffstown site, estimated the cost of remediation work at €30 million or more. This would involve the removal of some 1.7 million cubic metres of waste over several years.
In the meantime, the EPA is seeking “fallback orders” against the directors personally – including Dr Nealon.
The others named in the proceedings are Anthony (Tony) Dean, founder of A1 Waste, and two associates, Keith Cairns and Samuel Stears.
Along with Dr Nealon, they are identified as directors of operating companies Neiphin Trading Ltd, which is in liquidation; Dean Waste Company Ltd, which is in receivership; and Jenzsoph Ltd, which is not trading.
Clean-up orders were made against the companies in the High Court on October 5th last and a programme of detailed measures was prepared for the court’s final orders, delivered on October 19th. The case against the directors remains before the court.
Last February, Dr Nealon – then describing himself as “environmental adviser to Neiphin Trading Ltd” – said the EPA had “failed or refused” to give its agreement to “various infrastructure and necessary maintenance works” at its site.
“Neiphin Trading Ltd are concerned that the failure by the EPA to agree various proposals which would improve the environmental performance of the facility is preventing them from operating [it] in an orderly fashion,” he said in a letter to the agency.
In May 2009, Anthony Dean was fined €10,000 after pleading guilty at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court to a reduced charge arising from the placement by Dean Waste of 500 lorry loads of inert construction and demolition waste at an illegal dump on a 47-acre site at Whitestown, Baltinglass, Co Wicklow, in 1998.
