Protest over bad smell from Killeeshil mushroom plant

A PROTEST is to take place this weekend over what residents living in the Killeeshil area claim is the stink coming from a mushroom plant.

Cabragh Concerned Residents Association are holding the picket outside the premises of Northway Mushrooms Limited on the Aughnagar Road on Saturday morning.

The plant has been operating locally for four years and during that time the residents have been reporting the odour to statutory bodies. They say that they have engaged with Northway Mushrooms Limited and have had several meetings with the council, the Northern Ireland Environment Agency and the Public Health Agency.

Plans to organise the protest were agreed and finalised at a public meeting in Killeeshil Community Centre a week ago.

It follows what residents say has been the lack of action by the organisations that they’ve been in contact with.

“We want to show Northway Mushrooms just how many people are affected by NML (Northway Mushrooms Limited) odours and after four years we feel that the agencies have not done enough to improve the odour or to penalise NML for causing severe air pollution in our locality,” the Cabragh Concerned Residents Association said.

CCRA says that activities at the local Cabragh Primary School and Killeeshil GAA have been heavily impacted by the odour.

They claim that children are often unable to go outside on their breaks and teachers are unable to open windows to allow air into the classrooms at the school, which has an enrolment of more than 200.

“This is simply not acceptable – our children should not be subjected to this level of pollution,” a CCRA spokesperson said. “This odour travels as far as five miles from the NMLA site and that is a huge area to be affected.”

The NIEA has said that it is aware of complaints in relation to the facility, and that the facility is regulated by them. They added that the company has made modifications and improvements to emission controls and that this work is ongoing.