REGARDING the Environment Agency's incredibly naive attempt to charge £15,000 for revealing the constituents of 'Cemfuel' burned by Castle Cement, Clitheroe (LET, July 21), the news might not be exactly appreciated by Minister Michael Meacher either, after his February intervention to carpet both the Agency and Ribble Valley.

But don't let's kid ourselves that the end of this six-year saga is nigh: leopards don't lose their spots. Consider the evidence.

Yes, there are prosecutions scheduled for three (or more?) breaches of the 'no haze and odour' condition in 1999, but this was only after Michael Meacher. A cosmetic exercise for ministerial consumption?

The Agency document setting out its intention to give Castle permission to trial the far more toxic 'Cemfuel' in kiln 7 was only made available immediately prior to the two Clitheroe 'surgeries,' preventing meaningful discussions on the day, particularly on the truly appalling menu of wastes, and cutting down on the likely attendance!

The Agency bible (the Bedford Protocol) for dealing with proposals to trial 'fuels' created from too-bad-to-recycle hazardous toxic waste such as 'Cemfuel' was drawn up after Castle was authorised to burn it in all three kilns in 1993, and is not retrospective.

Two years ago, I was one of many consultees on a revised protocol. True to Environment Agency form, the previously "unavailable" revised protocol arrived 19 days after the 30-day period for comment which followed the surgeries. Anything raised by consultees - two of whose names were missing from the list - which related to the Clitheroe situation was airily dismissed with the phrase, "Specific local issues are outside the scope of this protocol." You bet they are! The Agency document will authorise Castle to trial 'Cemfuel' in kiln 7 for a six-month period only; if successful, Castle will have to re-apply to gain full authorisation.

OK, so this is a vast improvement on what goes on at present, and there are in it provisions where the trials will be ended, but the 'no offensive haze and odour' condition was also hailed as the ultimate solution and nothing much came of that.

There's nothing wrong with shared prosperity, but what appreciation has Ribble Valley Council of the environmental situation and what is it doing about it?

The message coming from the regulatory and protective bodies with responsibility for health and the environment seems to be to find ways of permitting industry to do whatever it wishes, nationally, and hang the consequences.

J D MORTIMER (Mr), Green Drive, Clitheroe.

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.