A PLAN to open a £6million tyre recycling plant in Clayton-le- Moors could go ahead.

The waste recycling centre, which would create around 45 jobs, has been recommended for approval subject to a long list of conditions suggested by planning officers.

The recommendations will go before Lancashire development control committee for a decision on Wednesday.

The bid to change vacant units at the town’s business park into a treatment plant would see the importation and storage of used car and truck tyres to be shredded on the site.

There would also be the recovery of tyre wire, rubber and waste plastics.

The plans had led to some concern that it would result in thousands more heavy lorry journeys for the area and residents had demanded reassurance that Blackburn and Whalley Road would not be used. Developers had responded that their main interest in the site was its proximity to the M65 and pledged that HGVs would not enter residential areas. County planning officers have said that subject to there being no objection from Hyndburn Council, planning permission should be granted subject to the conditions The report summarises that: “Waste tyres are not permitted to be disposed of to landfill.

“The recycling of tyres, wire and plastics would move waste up the waste management hierarchy and would facilitate their use for beneficial purposes.

Operations would be located within an existing industrial estate and would have no unacceptable operational impact.”

A list of conditions sugg-ested by officers seek to control hours of working and vehicle movements, site operations, control of noise and the safeguarding of watercourses and drainage.

Dexter Stubbs, director of the company behind the plans, J7 Global Ltd, said: “We have worked closely with the Environment Agency throughout the development of the project, consulting them and the planning authority on all aspects of the proposed facility.

“We are keen to ensure we will not have an adverse effect on any part of the environment.”