CAMPAIGNERS against the proposed Hartlebury Incinerator have expressed their disappointment that funding for the £165 million plant has been given the go-ahead.

Worcestershire County Council’s cabinet unanimously approved plans to progress with the pro - posed new Energy-from-Waste (EfW) facility at a meeting last Thursday.

Worcestershire taxpayers will have to fork out £125 million of the loan and Herefordshire Council’s cabinet also agreed to authorise “all necessary steps” to obtain the other £40 million from the Public Works Loans Board and loan it to Mercia Waste Management to build the plant. It now needs to go to full council for a final vote.

Ray Kirby, chairman of action group Worcestershire Resident Against Incineration and Landfill
(WAIL), said other more afford able and environmentally suitable alternatives had not been fully ex plored by the county council.

“WAIL still advocate that there is no need for this plant as figures already show waste to land fill is declining, recycling is up and there is, currently in the West Midlands sufficent incineration capacity to cover what is going to landfill."

He also accused the county coun cil of “scaremongering” for claiming landfill sites would soon be full.

“There are plenty of commercial land fill sites in Worcestershire with capacity,” Mr Kirby said.

EnviRecover, which will be built on Hartlebury Trading Estate, will have capacity to divert 200,000 tonnes of waste from landfill sites each year Planning consent for the plant was given the go-ahead by the Secretary of State in July last year.

Construction is expected to start next year and it is expected to be fully operational in early 2017 The county council said “doing nothing” and not pursuing the proposal would cost an extra £128 million.

Conservative Anthony Blagg, the county council’s cabinet member for environment, said the decision to progress was “good news” for residents.

“We are committed as ever to preventing waste being produced in the first place and reducing the amount of waste sent to landfill, which impacts on the environment and is costly to the taxpayers of both counties,” he added.

The proposed EfW plant is expected to create 250 jobs during construction and 45 when operational.