Environmental odour news

GUELPH — The municipal organics plant on the city’s south-east side has been cleared as the source of two odour complaints, city councillor Ian Findlay has announced. “In my mind, I think that ends it,” Findlay said Wednesday. The provincial Ministry of the Environment was informed by two residents near the Dunlop Drive composting plant Monday morning of odour problems. It launched an investigation along with municipal solid waste staff. They concluded, as Findlay reported on his blog, that data on prevailing winds that morning indicated the air from the plant was moving away from the residents, not toward them. It suggested the plant wasn’t the source. Findlay said at this time of year it wouldn’t be improbable to have various unknown scents in the air, such as fertilizers on nearby agricultural fields. He was unaware of other public complaints in recent months, he added. The facility temporarily stopped accepting new waste last November after about 10 pungent odour complaints w...

AN award-winning micro-brewery looks set to continue production in Darwen despite a neighbour’s complaints over ‘acrid’ odours. Hopstar Brewery set up in a new industrial unit at Rinus Business Park, in Grimshaw Street, Darwen, in July 2010. A year later Owen Taylor, who runs Tower Signs in a neighbouring unit, complained of headaches and nausea as a result of odours produced during brewing. Subsequently, Hopstar managing director, Natalie Tyson, said work had been carried out to prevent odours from passing into other units. And in an attempt to satisfy her neighbour, she has sent a retrospective plans to Blackburn with Darwen Council, requesting a change of use to a micro-brewery. The application, which will be discussed by the borough’s Planning and Highways Committee next week, includes a letter of objection from Mr Taylor. It says: “At certain stages of the brewing process, odours are produced. “I would describe this odour as a strong, malty, acrid smell.” Mr Taylor said th...