An Bord Pleanála has granted Greenstar Recycling Holdings Ltd permission for a controversial landfill development in east Galway.
The approval is subject to 26 conditions, and the landfill's life is limited to 10 years. However, Greenstar's own appeal to have the waste capacity extended from 70,000 tonnes to 100,000 has been upheld by the planning appeals board.
The landfill at Killagh More, near Kilconnell, will also be able to take non-hazardous waste from the south Connacht region, and not just Galway city and county as stipulated in the original planning permission granted by Galway County Council.
The company, which is part of the National Toll Roads (NTR) consortium, said yesterday it was very pleased to have received planning permission and was studying its detail. The landfill would provide "much-needed infrastructure for the Connacht region, where waste management capacity is reaching crisis point".
Mr Tom Finn, spokesman for the Kilconnell, Cappataggle, New Inn Anti-Dump Group, said there were "tears and devastation" yesterday over the decision.
He said the group intended to meet early next week with its legal advisers with a view to seeking a judicial review of the decision, an appeal to Europe or both. The decision comes just over two months after An Bord Pleanála's hearing on the issue in Oranmore, Co Galway.
Galway County Council granted approval for the project last year, while also approving in principle construction of a State landfill at Cross/New Inn about four miles away.
The State landfill for Cross/New Inn will replace the dump at Poolboy in Ballinasloe under the Connacht Waste Management Plan, and aims to take half of the province's waste when fully developed. It will have a capacity of two million tonnes and a timeframe of 20 years.
The appeals board inspector, Mr Robert Ryan, said in his report yesterday that the privately developed Greenstar landfill was an interim solution, pending development of the State landfill.
He referred to the Connacht regional plan's targets of 50 per cent recycling, 30 per cent thermal treatment (incineration) and 20 per cent landfill, and said these could be very difficult to achieve, given the high level of population in rural areas.
The lack of a thermal treatment facility, delays in developing recycling and waste-reduction facilities and in developing a new landfill for north Connacht had created "severe difficulties".
The "ideal scenario" would be to extend the life of the existing landfill at Poolboy, Ballinasloe, but this must be closed under legal constraints by 2005.
"From the information to hand, it is quite apparent that there is a major shortage of landfill capacity in the short term, and therefore the need for a development such as this is quite compelling," Mr Ryan said.
The company says it expects to have a full EPA licence within the next month and hopes to begin construction early next year.