Energy from waste facility (EfW), waste transfer station and ancillary buildings at Chineham

• An application for the construction of an EfW facility including a waste transfer station and ancillary buildings, capable of dealing with 90 000 tpa of municipal waste was submitted by Onyx to Hampshire County Council (HCC) in October, 1998. The site at Chineham was already owned by HCC. The application involved the demolition of an existing incinerator which no longer met with modern standards.

• The application went to committee with recommendation for approval and subject to a legal agreement for off-site highway improvements in November, 1999. The planning certificate was issued in January, 2000 once the legal agreement had been signed.

• The delay in the determination resulted from the PPC permit application and the planning application being sent to the Environment Agency (EA) at the same time. This was helpful but did mean the receipt of the EA's comments took longer than expected.

• Local residents formed an action group and a couple of hundred objections were received. However, the community engagement led by Onyx helped to explain the proposal to local residents

Keys to the delivery of the Chineham facility

• Onyx undertook extensive community engagement and a contact group was set up for representatives from the community; clear explanations of all aspects of the process, technology and design were made available.

• Considerable importance was attached to the design of the plant which was on a par with attention given to the technology itself.

• Very careful processing was undertaken with the application due to the potential conflict of interest in having the Waste Planning and Waste Disposal Authorities within Hampshire CC.

• Prior to the submission of the application there was a 12-month period of background monitoring of air and water quality in order to ensure a robust environmental statement to support the application.