I READ with interest that the long awaited study into the potential impacts of waste incinerators on human health is now expected this spring.

This study, funded by Public Health England was first announced in 2012 with concerns over infant mortality amongst other things and involves examining areas up to 5km and 22 incinerators across the UK.

I would urge that Gloucestershire County Council cancel their contract with UBB if this study raises concerns.

Last year the Plymouth Herald highlighted that emissions from the giant new incinerator in the city were the highest ever recorded in a UK residential area.

Plume plotter, a site set up by a Gloucestershire resident, which plots incinerator pollution, highlighted high concentrations of nitrogen oxide near the incinerator in heavily populated areas.

The pollution was also being spread as far as Cornwall and Dartmoor.

With the Government being exposed yet again by the European Commission and given a final warning to take even the most basic action to combat air pollution crisis that needlessly claims the lives of more than 50,000 people in Britain every year, I have little faith that my concerns will be addressed.

With the impact of the incinerator pollution at Javelin Park combining with vehicular pollution from the nearby M5, nitrogen oxide levels are set to soar!

For the sake of over 20,000 children in particular, who attend school within five miles of the Javelin Park incinerator I urge the authorities to consider the long term consequences of their actions.

Of particular concern are the dioxins and PM1 and PM2.5 particulates which are released when waste is incinerated and are thought to cause premature infant and child deaths when inhaled by humans and have been linked to adverse health effects including birth defects, childhood cancers, respiratory illnesses and heart attacks.

The Environment Agency has admitted that 90 per cent of PM1s and 35 per cent of PM2.5s escape through filters installed in UK incinerators.

This means that UK incinerators are emitting somewhere between 40-120 times more particulates than those in Finland or Sweden, where air regulations are tighter.

From an environmental perspective at a time when we should be driving down CO2, which impact on climate change, it has been identified that for each unit of electricity generated, incinerators produce more CO2 than gas and coal powered stations.

In a report produced by Eunomia in 2008 incineration was amongst the worst performing waste treatment technologies ranked according to cost to society of the carbon produced.

Added to this, the 200 lorry movements (one every minute) every day to feed this monstrosity, the potential to contaminate local farmland and cattle, the damage caused by ozone formation as a result of emissions to our Cotswolds Beech woods and the fact that of the 190,000 tonnes of waste that the incinerator will process every year, as much as 127,300 tonnes could be recycled, composted or reused; have Gloucestershire County really made the right decision in granting this incinerator.

As a someone elected to represent the people of a ward, predicted to be hit badly by pollution from the incinerator why should I stay silent and let my worries and those of many of my constituents who have contacted me fester into intense anxiety.

Jonathan Edmunds

Green Party district councillor for Randwick, Whiteshill and Ruscombe