HEALTH fears have been sparked over a controversial plan to install a metal smelting furnace on the outskirts of Aberystwyth.

C B Environmental, the company which operates the Rheidol Recycling Centre on Glanyrafon Industrial Estate, applied for an environmental air pollution control permit — also known as a Part B permit — on 17 November, in order to be able to fit a “reconditioned McIntyre single chamber sloping hearth furnace” at the site and allow them to recycle scrap metal.

In its risk assessment section, applicant C B Environmental’s operations director Leon Gobourn states there is a “medium” likelihood that smelting will produce fumes, ash and dross, which could cause “respiratory irritation and illness” for people “living or working close to the site”.

Speaking to the Cambrian News this week, Glanyrafon councillor Alun Lloyd Jones said he needed “an awful lot of assurances” before he would be satisfied with the plan.

One of the statutory bodies, Public Health Wales, says it was consulted by the council, but not provided with details of the proposed emissions stack, which would allow it to calculate the risk of pollution to people in the area.

After requesting this information from the council on 7 January, PHW told the Cambrian News this week it was still without the stack height figures.

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