The Environment Agency should insist on the continuous monitoring of fumes coming out of the Crymlyn Burrow's incinerator so as to protect local residents, the Welsh Liberal Democrat Assembly Member for South Wales West, Peter Black, has said.
Mr. Black was speaking after residents living around the waste recycling plant were told that potentially-cancer-causing dioxin emissions were found to have been three times the limit when tested in December last year. Dioxins, known to increase the likelihood of cancer in humans, were the prime ingredient in the controversial "Agent Orange" used by the Americans to defoliate forests in the Vietnam War. It subsequently caused major health problems for GIs, civilians and Vietcong fighters.
"When this plant was first opened the Environment Agency promised residents that they would deploy new testing equipment there that would continuously monitor the emissions coming from the incinerator," said Mr. Black. "However, they subsequently reneged on that promise and deployed the equipment elsewhere instead. Residents rely on the tests carried out by the Agency to provide them with some reassurance as to the safety of the incinerator. These latest results show that testing is inadequate and that it needs to be stepped up."
"I am concerned that the tests for dioxins are only conducted over a six-hour time period, twice a year. If the December figures are correct, which I believe they are, then what were the dioxin emissions during the preceding six hours, or six days, six weeks or even six months? "What about the dioxin emissions during the time after this sample was extracted and before the results were known? The only way of safeguarding public health would be for the facility to use continuous sampling of dioxins."
