INCINERATOR plans will turn to dust if councillors agree with officers' recommendations on Monday night.
A council meeting will hear that, following strong concerns from nearby residents and major food manufacturers, plans for a pyrolysis and gasification plant on Wrexham Industrial Estate should be dropped.
'That is the only recommendation with regard to burning waste,' said Wrexham County Borough Council chief legal and administration officer Trevor Coxon.
'Instead, the contractor responsible for the waste will need to have an agreement with a waste-burning facility outside the area, like a cement kiln, where non-recyclable waste can be disposed of.'
The industrial estate would still house the composting, mechanised sorting of recyclable waste and the transportation of waste to a recycling facility and would support the expansion of the kerbside collection scheme.
'The site plan remains the same but we will not build a waste-burner,' said Mr Coxon.
The plan for a thermal treatment plant was put forward by Portuguese waste management company HLC.
Recently the company has taken a back seat as the Waste Recycling Group took over as a corporate partner.
Despite repeated claims by HLC that the burning process was the cleanest it could be, concerns were raised by residents about the planned incinerator and its effect on health.
Neighbouring companies in Wrexham Industrial Estate turned against the plan, too.
Kellogg's led the way, submitting a 45-page dossier of concerns over airborne contamination of food and how HLC's proposal failed to provide satisfactory evidence the process was safe.
Businesses on the park even claimed to be withholding £23m of investment for the area until they knew the out-come of the saga.
HLC spokeswoman Judith Harper said the thermal treatment plan had cost a lot to prepare.
'I cannot say how much but the investment was always at risk as long as we didn't have planning permission,' she said.
'The removal of the thermal treatment element will have a cost impact. It will make the site more expensive to run because it will no longer be generating some of its own power, it will draw all its energy from external sources.
'It will also cost to transport the waste to other areas. The thermal treatment facility would have made things cheaper but we find ourselves in this position and we have to live with it.'
Monday's meeting will take place at the Guildhall at 6.30pm and the debate will be held in public. Unusually, members of the public will be allowed to submit questions or make statements to the full council on the issue.
The final decision on the way forward for the project will be taken by the council's Executive Board on Tuesday, November 8.
Council leader Aled Roberts said: 'We are committed to open and transparent decision-making in Wrexham whenever possible.
'This council meeting will not only provide the opportunity for members to debate the issue in public but for the public to hear about the proposals first hand.'
If you would like to put a question or make a statement to the council on this issue, then put your request in writing to: Trevor Coxon, Chief Legal and Administration Officer, The Guildhall, Wrexham LL11 1AY or e-mail trevor. coxon@wrexham.gov.uk.
Each speaker will have up to three minutes to make their point and a total of 15 minutes has been allocated for speakers.
Anyone wishing to speak must have their notification in at the Guildhall before noon tomorrow (Friday), giving a written summary of what they wish to say. Slots will be allocated on a first come, first served basis.
