Flies, rats and offers of hush money – the price of living next to a ‘monster’ incinerator

BBC / Jon Parker LeeGeorge and Mandy are among the residents who refused to sign an NDA agreement and can speak about the Runcorn incinerator“We have been inundated with flies, rats, smell, noise. It's just been horrendous,” says Mandy Royle, who lives in the closest home to the UK’s biggest waste incinerator at Runcorn in Cheshire.
The facility generates electricity from burning nearly a million tonnes of household rubbish every year – but much of that waste doesn't come from Ms Royle's local area. Like many incinerators, deliveries come from hundreds of miles away.
BBC analysis suggests the burden of the UK's waste is disproportionately falling on deprived areas such as Runcorn, which are 10 times more likely to have an energy-from-waste incinerator in their midst than in the wealthiest areas.
Burning rubbish now UK’s dirtiest form of power