ASA Adjudication on SITA UK Ltd
SITA UK Ltd t/a
Surrey Waste Management
Vine Court
Chalkpit Lane
Dorking
Surrey
RH14 1AJ
Date:
26 October 2011
Media:
Circular
Sector:
Business
Number of complaints:
1
Complaint Ref:
A10-140798
Ad
A circular, distributed in support of Charlton Lane Eco Park, a waste management development, included an artist’s impression of the proposed site along with text which stated "Surrey Waste management is working on behalf of Surrey County Council to develop an Eco Park at Charlton Lane, Shepperton ... OUR PROPOSAL The aim of the proposed Eco Park at Charlton Lane is to divert as much waste as possible from landfill and produce renewable energy from the waste that cannot be recycled ... SUSTAINABLE BY DESIGN Sustainability is at the core of the proposal embracing the reduce, reuse, recycle premise through new technology but also in its construction ... AIR QUALITY We would ensure that the emissions from the Eco Park have an insignificant effect on local air quality. The Environment Agency (EA) monitors the emissions from the gasifier and ensures the plant is working properly and that strict national and international standards are being adhered to. The EU standard for Nitrogen Oxides is 200mg/NM3, but we have designed a plant that would achieve 100mg/NM3 or less ... ARE THE TECHNOLOGIES PROVEN? Batch oxidation system gasification plants are currently in operation in Dumfries, Scotland and Iceland. An anaerobic digestion facility is currently operating in Deerdykes, Scotland. These facilities are all operating successfully and emissions are within predicted levels".
Issue
The complaint, a local resident challenged whether:
1. the term "Eco", which was used to describe the development, was misleading because it implied the park was environmentally friendly, when they understood that the proposal included a 'batch oxidation gasifier', which was an incinerator, which would emit pollutants into the atmosphere, some of which would be unfiltered. They also understood the site would be built on greenbelt land;
2. the question: "Are the technologies proven?", answered by "Batch oxidation system gasification plants are currently in operation in Dumfries, Scotland and Iceland" was misleading because they believed it implied that the Charlton Lane gasifier would use the same technology as the plants mentioned, when they understood that an untested gasifier prototype had been proposed;
3. the claim that existing facilities "are all operating successfully" was misleading, because they understood that these facilities had caused, or faced, numerous problems;
4. the drawings used to illustrate the park were misleading because they did not accurately reflect what the park would look like; and
5. the use of "gasifier" to describe the proposed incinerator was misleading, because they understood that gasification was only part of the overall waste combustion process.
Response
SITA Surrey said the newsletter was distributed in October 2010 to inform residents of the latest stage of SITA Surrey's proposals to build an Eco Park at Charlton Lane, Shepperton. They stated that this was only one of a number of newsletters and that later newsletters contained more up-to-date information on the plans for the Eco Park.
1. They said that the phrase "Eco Park" was used in the waste industry to describe a number of waste management facilities sited in one location and that the proposed Charlton Lane site would have a number of environmental benefits over current operations, such that the "Eco Park" name was justified. They said the proposed Eco Park would process household waste that would otherwise be sent to landfill, which subsequently lowered the amount of methane released into the atmosphere. They also said there was a potential for up to a 49% reduction in the number of larger vehicles using the site on weekdays, resulting in subsequent reductions in traffic pollution. They said they had issued a carbon report which predicted carbon emissions from the Eco Park and that they believed it would save up to 119,410 tonnes of carbon per year compared with the existing waste transfer operations at the site. They said that any energy produced by the facility would also be "off-set" against the carbon impact produced by standard fossil fuels and that the facility had been sustainably designed taking into account the use of solar panels and rainwater harvesting. They said that the facility would also include a waste hierarchy system within the community recycling centre which would result in larger products being re-used as opposed to being recycled or disposed of.
They said the Eco Park would also include an 'oxidation system gasifier', which differed from the process of conventional incineration. They stated that incinerators burned waste directly but that gasification resulted in the waste being heated to produce a syngas which was then extracted and burned separately to produce energy which was subsequently converted into electricity. They said ground emissions would be kept to a minimum and that the proposed 48-metre stack would only disperse emissions once they had been through a rigorous clean-up process. They said any emissions would be monitored by the Environment Agency to ensure the strict national and international standards were adhered to.
They added that the Charlton Lane site was located within the Green Belt but that there had been a waste management facility there since the 1950s and that it pre-dated the designation of the area as Green Belt. They also stated that “Eco” was a well understood term and that in this context it would be understood to mean that the “Eco Park” was a more sustainable way of dealing with household waste than the alternative, which was landfill.
2. They said the Charlton Lane gasifier would use the same technology as the Dumfries plant, which was operated by Scotgen, which itself was an upgrade of the Icelandic facility which had been operating since May 2006. They said that the Charlton Lane facility included a re-designed boiler although the gasification technology was the same as that used at the existing facilities.
3. They said the Dumfries plant on which the technology was based had been operating successfully, although they agreed that there had been some issues that needed to be resolved during the commissioning phase which ended on 1 November 2010. They said that the main issue concerned the installation of the wrong type of boiler but that this was due to be replaced in Summer 2011. They stated that they had recently been made aware that the Icelandic plant had failed its 2009 dioxin test but that a further test had not been carried out in 2010. They said they had received no further information to indicate that there had been further problems on this site. They stated that in any event, the UK the Environment Agency would closely monitor emissions from the proposed plant in Surrey and that non-compliant sites would be shut down.
4. They stated that the design of the proposed facility was an interactive process and that the form of the buildings themselves evolved during late 2009 and early 2010 following input from designers, technology providers and other stakeholders. They stated that the images of the site were up to date at the time of publication and that the height of the stack could only be determined following the input from the various interested parties on the design of the facility. They stated that it was therefore inevitable that there would be a number of changes before the design was finalised.
5. They stated that ‘gasification’ was a recognised method of dealing with waste and was an entirely different process to incineration. They stated that gasification involved heating but not burning waste and that the combustions of the resulting syngas created heat which in turn generated power. They stated that the Charlton Lane proposal included anaerobic digestion and gasification but no direct combustion or incineration. They stated that Defra guidance recognised gasification as an 'Energy from Waste' technology.
Assessment
THIS ADJUDICATION REPLACES THAT PUBLISHED ON 11 MAY 2011. THE VERDICT ON POINTS 2 & 3 HAS CHANGED, MAKING THE COMPLAINT ON THESE POINTS UPHELD.
1. Not upheld
The ASA noted the proposed facility would include a type of waste incineration which would result in the emission of Nitrous Oxides and the creation of toxic ash. We understood that the facility would result in a significant reduction in the volume of waste that would be sent to landfill from the area and that this was explained in the leaflet. We also understood that local consumers would be aware that the proposed site was due to replace an existing facility which had been built prior to the area being designated as greenbelt land. We considered that the description of the planned facility as an "ECO PARK", for a leaflet that was intended to inform local residents about the benefits of a planned waste management facility, would be understood by some consumers to be a claim that it would be actively beneficial to the environment. However, we noted the term “Eco” was a term that was regularly used to describe developments in technology or functions which resulted in a reduced environmental impact compared to that of previous developments or facilities which had the same function, and noted “Eco Towns” was a term which had been used to describe government-sponsored new towns which would collectively take on board methods of reducing environmental impacts compared to that of normal towns. We considered that within the context of the ad in its entirety, most recipients would understand that the phrase “Eco” referred to the reduction in the environmental impact compared to that of the previous waste disposal facility on that site and that of traditional waste disposal facilities. We therefore concluded that in this context the phrase “Eco” was not misleading.
On this point we investigated the ad under CAP Code (Edition 12) rules 3.1, 3.2, 3.3 (Misleading advertising), 3.7 (Substantiation) 11.3 and 11.4 (Environmental claims) but did not find it in breach.
2. & 3. Upheld
We understood that it was accepted that gasification technology had been used at various facilities across the world and that the theory of heating waste, rather than burning it, was a viable way of reducing the volume of waste sent to landfill. We also understood that gasification technology has been developed in some facilities for the purpose of generating power. However, we considered that consumers would interpret the claim within the context of the text that followed, which stated that the facilities in Dumfries and Iceland “are all operating successfully”. We therefore considered that most readers would interpret the entire text as a claim that the gasification planned for the Charlton Lane site had also been proven to work successfully, and in the same way and on the same basis as at the referenced facilities. We understood that, although both facilities used primary gasification, the Icelandic facility was set up to process waste with little or no recycling involved and that the Dumfries plant processed pre-treated waste, consisting of commercial, residential and hazardous sources, in order to try and generate electricity from it. We understood that the Charlton Lane site was different in that it was only going to use household waste (which would consist of black bin waste from households who were already strongly encouraged to recycle their rubbish before it was sent to landfill) and it intended to use that waste to generate electricity. We noted this was not the same use of the technology as had been applied in Iceland and Dumfries. We also noted that the facility in Iceland had failed its dioxin test in 2009, and that the site at Dumfries had experienced problems with the design of its boilers which were being replaced and that the plant had yet to generate electricity. We considered that the implied claim that the intended use of gasification was to super-heat non-recycled household waste within the predicted emissions levels had not been substantiated by the examples given and concluded that the ad was misleading.
On these points the ad breached CAP Code (Edition12) rules 3.1, 3.2, 3.3 (Misleading advertising), 3.7 (Substantiation), 11.1 and 11.4 (Environmental claims).
4. Upheld
We noted the exact design of the building was an ongoing process and that it evolved significantly through the planning process. However, we noted the October 2010 newsletter was in the latter stage of the design process and considered that any artist impressions of the structure issued during this time should have been accurate because the relative height of the stack would have already been determined. We noted the artist’s impression in the ad showed a large building with a chimney stack, surrounded by a car park. We noted the image showed that the stack would be higher than the main structure of the building and that the illustration demonstrated that this would be larger than the cars and trees in the surroundings of the building. However, we considered that the image of the stack did not make clear that it would be up to 48 metres tall and therefore would be a significant feature of the structure and visible from the surrounding area. We concluded that the image did not accurately reflect the likely height of the stack and concluded that the ad was misleading.
On this point the ad breached CAP Code (Edition 12) rules 3.1, 3.2, 3.3 (Misleading advertising), 3.7 (Substantiation).
5. Not upheld
We noted most readers would not be familiar with the term “gasifier” and would not be aware of the processes involved in turning waste into electricity. However, we considered that the impact of the understanding of the facility would not be based on the exact processes involved in gasification, but rather the implications for the environment on a local and world level and noted the ad made clear that the facility would produce Nitrous Oxide emissions, albeit in line with strict national standards. We concluded that the use of the word “gasifier” was not misleading.
We investigated this point the ad breached CAP Code (Edition 12) rules 3.1, 3.2, 3.3 (Misleading advertising) and 3.7 (Substantiation) but did not find it in breach.
Action
The ad should not appear again in its current form.
