Wicklow County Council is to return to the High Court over what it claims to be the failure of a company to comply with a previous order to clear up a major illegal dump in west Wicklow.
Two years ago, in the first case of its kind, the council secured a High Court order against the owners of the company responsible for the dumping, and the landowner, to clean up the site at Coolnamadra, near Donard.
The site is believed to contain about 8,000 tonnes of rubbish, including medical waste from the Mater Hospital and Blackrock Clinic, Dublin.
It was the first of a series of large illegal dumps uncovered by Wicklow County Council during the course of an investigation by officials.
In August last year the company, Swacliffe Ltd (Dublin Waste), and its owners, Ms Eileen and Mr Louis Moriarty, and the landowner, Mr Clifford Fenton, were given an Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) licence to clean up the site within 12 months.
However, last month the EPA issued a warning letter to Swacliffe after inspectors found that while there has been some machinery on the site, very little of the waste had been removed.
Inspectors have also provided detailed reports to Wicklow County Council about progress on the site.
A spokesman for Wicklow council said it believed most of the waste was still on the site, two years after the initial High Court order.
"It's the council's position that they're in breach of the High Court order. It's our intention to go back to the High Court to enforce the original order, and we have instructed our legal team to do so."
The respondents in the case could face jail if they are found by the High Court to be in contempt of the original order.
Swacliffe's directors have already paid the council €200,000 in recent months to cover the costs of the original investigation into the site.
Because of the presence of medical waste, the clean-up of the site is expected to be hugely expensive, running into the millions of euro.
The Coolnamadra site has also been the subject of a Garda investigation. A file on the site is expected to be sent to the Director of Public Prosecutions shortly.