Waste firm to pay £68,500 for liquid cyanide leak in Derbyshire
The Environment Agency prosecuted a waste transport company for causing liquid cyanide to leak from a lorry at an industrial estate in Heanor, Derbyshire.
J & G Environmental Ltd of Fareham, Hampshire had previously pleaded guilty to the charge of causing an illegal water discharge. It prompted the Fire Service to set up decontamination protocols and caused hundreds of fish deaths in a nearby pond.
The incident, which occurred on 6 February 2018, happened when a container ruptured as the driver started moving them around, having borrowed a forklift truck. Hundreds of litres of a liquid, which contained diluted cyanide, began to escape going onto the floor before entering the drainage system and natural waterways.
J & G Environmental Ltd were fined £16,000 and ordered to pay costs of £52,500
Buckinghamshire firm pays heavily for packaging oversight
A Buckinghamshire company made a financial contribution of almost £21,000 to a local charity, plus Environment Agency costs, after it failed to comply with packaging waste regulations designed to protect the environment.
Hi-Tech Coatings International Limited, an Aylesbury-based coatings manufacturer, pledged £20,935.76 to the Berks, Bucks and Oxon Wildlife Trust, after failing to comply with the law.
The law in question—the Producer Responsibility Obligations (Packaging Waste) Regulations 2007 (as amended)—aims to ensure that businesses fund the recycling of the packaging waste that they place on the UK market.
Any company handling more than 50 tonnes of packaging a year, and with a turnover in excess of £2 million, must register with the Environment Agency or a packaging compliance scheme, and meet their responsibilities for recycling waste packaging.”
East London waste boss fined for obstructing site checks
The owner of a waste treatment plant in Barking barred environment inspectors from entering the site unless they handed over thousands of pounds in bogus fees.
Gurjit Athwal, director of Keep Green Ltd was fined £3,000 with more than double again in costs and other court charges, after twice refusing entry to officers from the Environment Agency.
She was charged with breaching regulation 34(2) of the Environmental Permitting (England and Wales) Regulations 2016. The law explains how the Environment Agency has “a duty to make appropriate periodic inspections of regulated facilities to ensure that the operator is complying with their permit.”
In addition to the £3,000 fine, magistrates ordered Athwal, of Cavendish Gardens, in Barking, to pay another £3,000 in costs, and a victim surcharge of £1.
