Residents vow to resist sewage plant extension
Residents today warned that any extension of a massive urban sewage treatment plant in Dublin would take place “over our dead bodies”.
The Government is considering a new report which proposes to extend the controversial plant at Ringsend, to build a second plant in Portrane, North Dublin and to upgrade the city’s sewerage systems at a combined cost of €2.6bn.
Residents in Ringsend, who have had to cope with obnoxious smells since the €300m sewage treatment plant opened in the area in 2003, said they would strongly opposed the plans.
“Over our dead bodies. Ringsend is off the list as far as we’re concerned in the environment group,” said chairman Damian Cassidy.
“We have had our fair share of nuisance over the last three years and nothing has been done.”
The Ringsend/Irishtown/Sandymount Environment Group has protested that it is not fair for the plant in its area to cope with the sewage of one million people.
Dublin City Council admitted earlier this year that the plant had capacity problems and it is working to overcome them.
Mr Cassidy said the members had initially been derided as cranks and then told that they were smelling stale seaweed.
“You don’t mistake the smell of sewage for seaweed,” he said.
He said the 10,000-strong population of Portrane should be consulted before a second sewage treatment plant was built in their area.
“There is no way these plants should be built anywhere near a built-up area.”
The Greater Dublin Strategic Drainage Study, which cost €10m to carry out over five years, is intended to cover the future needs of Dublin, as well as parts of Meath, Kildare and Wicklow until 2031.
It recommends the immediate extension of the Ringsend sewage treatment plant at a cost of €50m and an upgrade of the sewerage systems in Dublin at a cost of €700m.
