Another day, another fire at a recycling plant, this time at a site near Hull (H/T Stewgreen).
Firefighters were battling a major fire at a waste recycling plant in Melton early today.
The fire broke out at a large facility in Gibson Lane shortly after 7am.
At least six crews from Humberside Fire and Rescue were in attendance and large plumes of acrid black smoke could be seen coming from the scene.
This is getting to be a familiar story isn't it?
A month ago there was one in Swindon. Two weeks earlier there was one in East London. In April there was one in Wrexham. In March there was one in Salford.
A report by the Chief Fire Officers' Association last year described one such incidient:
...the incident at the Jayplas Recycling Depot in Smethwick produced some truly startling statistics, with approximately 100,000 tonnes of recycled plastic involved in a fire that at its height required the deployment of 39 Fire engines and over 200 Firefighters. In the first 12 hours of operations, 14 Million litres of water were used simply to contain a fire that released an estimated 19,000 tonnes of carbon into the atmosphere. (West Midlands Fire Service, 2013).
;)
Cleaner, greener Britain not quite as described.As I am fond of noting, most recycling appears to be economic insanity, driven by alleged benefits on the carbon emissions front rather than hard-headed cost-benefit analysis (exceptions are aluminium and precious metals). The resources that have to be ploughed into recycling appear to be routinely ignored.
It's hard to credit the idea that, say, hydraulic fracturing represents an unacceptable environmental risk but that recycling is going to give us a better, cleaner country.
How long will it be before recycling is forbidden, rather than compulsory?