H Mullaney & Son – Bespoke Permit Variation

Based in Mossley, Greater Manchester, H Mullaney & Son Ltd operate a waste transfer station for non-hazardous industrial waste from the local area. The site is a long-established facility with the client holding a waste management licence under the Environmental Protection Act 1990 (a pre-cursor to an environmental permit) since 1998. The client was seeking to expand the boundary of the permitted facility to allow for further treatment of the waste accepted onto site. The client was also seeing permission to increase the annual throughput of waste from 25,000 tonnes per annum to 75,000 tonnes per annum. The permit also needed to be updated to a modern version.

WRM’s team worked in line with the client team, to fully understand the proposal that was being put forward by the client, before taking full responsibility for the production, management and final submission of the permit application. WRM conducted discussions with the Environment Agency (EA) on the clients behalf, in order to fully confirm the requirements of the application, and to determine the extent and level of detail required for the permit documents.

Following initial basic pre-application engagement with the EA, a review of initial information supplied by the client and proximity to sensitive receptors and statutory designations (i.e. RAMSAR or SSSI), it was identified that a bespoke permit variation would be required for the project. WRM furnished H Mullaney & Son Ltd with a full set of environmental permit management system documents to cover the operation, maintenance arrangements and emissions management for the site, in conjunction with populating the necessary permit application forms. Given the age of the existing Waste Management Licence, a full permit management system was required.

The documents were produced in line with WRM’s expectation of the EA’s requirements for a bespoke permit variation application. This diligent approach to permit document production seeks to reduce the number of clarifications raised by the EA at the Schedule 5 stage, resulting in the timely issue of the permit.

The adoption of a client-orientated approach from project inception to project closure ensures that the priorities and commitments of the client are fully recognised and appreciated from the project outset. The WRM team is thus capable of providing project support in a discrete yet smooth manner, and in line with client objectives. Obtaining key information from the client at an early stage of the project process is vital, and WRM facilitate this process smoothly with the benefit of technical knowledge and extensive experience, accrued from working on a variety of waste transfer station applications.

To reduce client burden and streamline the application process, the full permit application is managed from start to finish by the WRM team.

Meaningful and effective discussions with the EA are critical to ensuring that regulator expectations are fully met, and that the subsequent permit is approved. WRM are well placed to identify and work through potential challenges of the permitting process on behalf of the client. This is attributed to detailed understanding of how such applications are reviewed, and the experience gained through providing permitting support to the industry on a wide variety of projects.

Following the process described above, WRM successfully managed the project up to the point at which the permit variation was granted by the Environment Agency.