Meeting Minutes 19 October 2023
Bryn Engagement Group - Minutes of the meeting held on 19 October 2023
Present
- Councillors: Councillors N. George, A. Gair, P. Leonard (Chair), B. Miles, J.A. Pritchard, H. Pritchard.
- Resident Representatives: H. David (MS), L. Green, M. Roberts, G. Davies, A. Gray, V. Muxworthy and S. Spencer
- Bryn Group: J. Price
- NRW: J. Rock, W. Grimstead and G. Baskerville
- Officers: R. Hartshorn, C. Edwards, and R. Thomas
Welcome and Introductions
Introductions were made and apologies were noted from Councillor N George as he would be late attending the meeting and Councillor Leonard would be Chairing the meeting today, apologies from D. Griffiths (NRW), K. Roberts (Resident), Officers M. S. Williams, C. Davies, H. Lancaster, and E. Sullivan
Minutes of the Meeting held on the 5th June 2023
The minutes were approved as an accurate record.
Matters arising from the Minutes.
Clarification was sought on whether a decision had been made by Cabinet Members on reviewing representation of the Group to include Community Councillors. The Group were advised that this would be discussed later in the meeting with Councillor George present.
A Member queried if the waste strategy would result in an increase in the number of vehicles entering Bryn Group. Environmental Health Officer advised the group of the timeline for the waste strategy.
Resident’s Representatives expressed concern regarding the inspections of the AD Plant at Bryn given the incident that occurred recently in Cassington. Natural Resources Wales advised that no inspections have taken place due to an issue with Officers’ personal gas alarms, this has prevented them attending sites. The Group were advised that hopefully this will be resolved by the end of the year or early next year. All were reassured that there are alarms on site, which are checked daily by the Bryn Group.
Update from Natural Resources Wales
Natural Resources Wales presented their briefing note, which provided a general overview of their regulation of the Bryn Group and confirmed that since the last meeting they have received 11 odour complaints. Over this period, they had been unable to confirm that the smell was attributable to the permitted facility. It is often found that where there is an obvious odour present it is linked to an agricultural activity both on-site and neighbouring farms. The Regulatory Officer confirmed the response process for odour complaints and advised that there is no ongoing enforcement action related to Bryn Group permitted activities.
The waste regulatory permit aspect of the site has been inspected twice during 2023/24 FY (11/07/23 and 11/10/23) with further unannounced visits expected between January and March 2024.
The Group were also advised that there have been no inspection for Bryn Group (AD Plant Permit) during 2023/24. However, a site inspection is due to be carried out between October 2023 to March 2024. A report of the inspection will be available on Natural Resources Wales Public Register which can be found on their website.
Clarification was sought on how complaints are dealt with if Officers do not attend the site and how can a desktop inspection work. Natural Resources Wales explained how they would contact the Bryn Group to determine if there are particular works on site causing any odours, if it is established that the odour is not coming from the site then Officers contact the Council and Officers would work with Environmental Health Officers from the Council to identify the source of the odour.
Residents queried how many complaints would it take before NRW would send an Officer out to investigate and suggested if for example 4 complaints were submitted would they attend the site? NRW confirmed that if they had received 4 complaints in one day then they would look to arrange for an Officer to investigate. Officers emphasised the importance that when complaints are made that as much detail as possible is provided to assist NRW and the Council with any investigation.
A Member enquired how the Council regulate the farms slurry spreading and how they can distinguish if the odour is coming from Bryn Group activities or surrounding farms and a query was raised as to whether the Bryn Group notify the Council and NRW when conducting the spreading of slurry. Environmental Health Officer confirmed that Officers have been fully trained and are able to identify the various odours, Officers will attend sites to determine where the odour is coming from, and it was confirmed that Bryn Group notifies the Council and NRW when they carry out slurry spreading but surrounding farms do not as there is no legal requirement for them to do this.
A Resident expressed the opinion that the smell was not from slurry spreading and that they have never experienced an odour of this kind in 60 years living in the area and that the smell has only been there since the Bryn Group opened.
The Senedd Member referred to the 11 complaints made to NRW and stated that this does not reflect the feelings in the Community. Resident’s Representatives expressed opinions that the Community have been raising complaints for over 25 years and are fed up, frustrated, and feel that they are not listened to or believed so they have stopped calling to raise complaints.
Update From Environmental Health
The Officer outlined the update included in the agenda pack in relation to dust, noise and odour and urged residents to call the Contact Centre to lodge any complaints, once logged the Contact Centre will raise a ticket and refer the complaint to Environmental Health Team who will investigate and attend site if available. The Group were advised that since the installation of the AD at the Bryn site the number of complaints regarding odour have dropped and that there were 8 complaints of which 5 coincided with spreading operations and 3 were when no spreading was taking place.
The Bryn Group explained how the AD works and a resident asked for clarity on how frequently Bryn Group spread slurry and if they receive complaints directly. It was confirmed that slurry spreading is carried out 3 to 4 times per year and that complaints are received, however the complaints do not always provide enough information to fully establish when or if the odour is coming from the site and requested that all complaints provide full details to help determine if the odour is coming from the site.
A Member requested that when different processes are taking place at the Bryn site could the Bryn Group put a notification of any change in activity on their website to identify the changes in the odours. This was agreed and they would also notify the Council and NRW. The Environmental Health Officer was asked to email the complaints process to the Group, this was agreed.
NRW confirmed that the Bryn Group are regulated by them and are notified of their activities and that they are fully compliant with their permit.
Residents requested an easier process to lodge complaints and asked if a nominated person in the Council could be possible. All parties discussed this, and it was confirmed that this was not possible. Members present confirmed that the Community Council could be a contact for the complaints, and they would then contact the Council on behalf of the residents to submit the complaints. All parties were advised that any complaints would need to be submitted quickly to enable Environmental Health Officers to investigate them.
Resident Representatives expressed their disappointment and frustrations and their opinion that they seemed to be going around in circles and not getting anywhere, this led to Residents Representatives stating that they were considering not attending the meetings any longer and that the Group should be disbanded. The Senedd Member urged the residents to reconsider this as the meetings are beneficial to all parties.
The Chair stated that if complaints are being raised over and over and are not being addressed then conversations with Officers should take place and feedback provided to the Group any findings. The Environmental Health Officer confirmed that they were happy to continue to work with the Officer dealing with the Community Engagement.
A concern was raised over the number of lorries accessing the Bryn site and stated that if another AD is brought onto the site this would increase the number of lorries further. The Chair advised that this would be referred to the Highways Department for their comments. It was also raised that there was concern over lorries arriving at the site before it opened and parking on the access drive to the site. The Cabinet Member advised that this had been approved previously following complaints about the lorries parking on the main road and it was agreed that this was the safest option. A request was made by the residents for a new traffic survey to be conducted by the Highways department. Resident Representatives queried electricity produced at the site It was confirmed that the supply of electricity to CCBC was being discussed but nothing has been decided at this stage.
Overview of Community Engagement Activity
The Chair informed the Group that the Officer had sent apologies for the meeting and read out an email from the Officer which asked all parties to contact her if there were any queries. Updated responses to residents’ questions were provided to all parties at the meeting.
Update from Bryn Group
The Bryn Group provided an update to the Group on the many Charities that they have been working with and advised that they are looking to appoint an Admin Apprenticeship role within the Company.
Following the incident in Cassington, the Bryn Group wanted to reassure residents that the site is safe and invited residents to appoint their own consultant to attend the site if they wished to have further testing conducted by an Independent Consultant.
The Bryn Group sought clarification from the Resident’s Representatives about what was happening with their dust monitoring equipment. The Residents confirmed that they are looking to sell the equipment as it is too expensive to obtain the readings and to get them analysed by an expert. It costs £3,000 to have a qualified person to take the readings and to calibrate the equipment on site. A Member suggested that if the Residents wrote to the Community Council, they would add this to their next meeting agenda to be discussed.
A Resident referred to page 5 of the minutes and queried the last paragraph of item 4 and asked whether an additional AD to the Bryn site would increase the traffic at the site. The Bryn Group confirmed that there is currently a digester and a storage tank on site, and they are looking to have another digester and storage tank and that this is going through the planning process. It was confirmed that under the current licence the site can take 35,000 tonnes but they are only processing 13,000 tonnes and the new digester will be used to serve any increase which will be 5,000 to 7,000 tonnes.
Residents asked to discuss a planning application regarding a new AD. Residents were informed that planning matters are not included in the Terms of Reference for this Group.
Residents Questions
Residents requested for the next meeting if the Bryn Group could provide a report on the results of the lightning strike at Cassington and a report on how much productivity will be increasing by.
A Resident Representative raised a query as to whether Community Councils can be included in these meetings. The Cabinet Member confirmed that Cabinet Members had been consulted and they did not approve it. The Resident sought clarification on the rationale for this decision. The Chair confirmed that this would be taken back to Cabinet for further discussions, and the decision will be brought back to the next meeting.
Date of Next Meeting(s)
The dates of the next meetings were confirmed on the agenda.
Meeting Closed At 14:42pm