COUNCILLORS have backed claims that major errors were made in allowing Castle Cement to burn controversial Cemfuel.

Ribble Valley Council's community committee last night supported claims by chief executive Dave Morris and chairman Graham Sowter that Castle Cement should never have been allowed to burn the solvent waste fuel at its Clitheroe plant because of problems with the smoke plume reaching the ground.

They said "major errors" were made by the Environment Agency's forerunner, Her Majesty's Inspectorate of Pollution, in allowing Castle Cement to burn Cemfuel.

Councillors voted unanimously to back the chief executive and chairman, while jubilant clean air campaigners said their claims that Cemfuel was damaging to health had finally been vindicated.

Environment Agency chiefs are defending their handling of the Cemfuel saga and have "completely rejected" the criticism.

The chief executive and chairman's report claimed there was a lack of independent testing of the trial burning of the fuel, and questioned the granting of permission to burn it at a plant where there was a "history of plume-grounding problems."

They concluded: "The result of these errors has been a fairly protracted and complex series of events to recover the initial error of judgment in allowing the burning of Cemfuel at an unsuitable plant."

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