Council asks airport to hand over forever chemical info

Fingal County Council has expressed concern with the Dublin Airport Authority over historic usage of “forever chemicals” and the DAA being reluctant to hand over any information they have on the issue.

The row marks a new front in the ongoing tensions between Fingal County Council and Dublin Airport, with the ongoing row over the passenger cap and the limiting of night flights serving as flashpoints between elected representatives, their constituents, and the airport. 

Fingal County Council members have asked the Dublin Airport Authority to hand over any data they have on forever chemicals, stating that it is in the public interest.

Dublin Airport Authority has not been forthcoming in handing over the data, members of Fingal County Council have stated.

Airport boss Kenny Jacobs told an Oireachtas committee last November that there were no forever chemicals in the water around Dublin Airport, despite a previous report from the Environmental Protection Agency stating this is the case.

In January, the DAA stated, “initial results from campus level monitoring indicate that there is PFAS in both ground and surface water at levels detectable in the laboratory and final results will be shared once the assessment is concluded.”

The DAA hired leading experts to determine the scale of the issue.

Firefighting foams are a major source of the chemicals, but firefighting foam containing forever chemicals has not been used at the airport since 2013.

However, there are concerns that historical residue has seeped into the soil.

For their part, the DAA has previously asked for planning permission to dig up 80,000 tonnes of soil and send them to Norway for expert analysis. 

The most recent meeting of Fingal County Council heard that the DAA have not been co-operating with the Council on the issue, despite being sent letters of enforcement.

Independent member of Fingal County Council Cathal Boland said “I am concerned we have made no real progress with regards to the enforcement issue. I know it’s not the fault of this council or the executive. The DAA decided, in their wisdom, to challenge it in the High Court.”

“The problems have been caused because the DAA has been slow in performing their functions in terms of processing court applications.”

“We can reasonably expect to hear the outcome of the case sometime in March, but I notice that the DAA has engaged in a cloak of secrecy with this report.”

Boland told the meeting that a Fingal resident had applied to see the EPA report, but the DAA sought an injunction from the information commissioner. 

“The DAA ran for cover; what is it are they hiding? That’s what I want to know, and that’s what the citizens of Fingal want to know. If there’s nothing wrong, why don’t they fess up? I think the case is made; bad neighbours, they’re certainly not good neighbours.”

Green Party Councillor Ian Carey said while on a canvass, he noticed an enforcement issue in the locality, with a constituent remarking “if Fingal County Council can’t get the DAA to enforce their laws, how are they going to get person X down the road to stick to planning?”

“The idea that the DAA is breaking the law has percolated right down to the community; that’s a major reputational risk for Fingal and the country at large.”

“What we’re doing as a council is holding the DAA to account but we need to be firmer in our stance,” he said.

He echoed Boland’s sentiments that the DAA are “working hard not to release information that is critical, and I don’t think that’s acceptable.”

“In this case, releasing the info will be reassuring. People in my community are asking me if they are affected by PFAS and these are people who are kilometres away from the airport. They are asking because they don’t understand the impact and we need to fill in the gaps.”

Carey’s Green Party colleague David Healy said “there are a lot of planning issues associated with the airport, the most recent one has been the issue of the PFAS and the extraction and taking off site of contaminated soil and it’s not clear from the report if those are one of the issues covered by the council and their enforcement letters.”

Social Democrats Councillor Paul Mulville noted that environmental campaigner Paddy Fagan sent a freedom of information request to Fingal County Council, but the DAA launched an appeal with the information commissioner to redact certain parts of the report.

“Obviously, they’re not happy with some of the information being released,” he remarked and called on the DAA to release the information in full.

Independents4Change Councillor Dean Mulligan said “as Councillors, we are often asked what is the Council doing in terms of enforcement notices and we get back ‘you are meant to be representing us” but we put in the same complaints as members of the public.

“We don’t have the facts, and don’t have the information; I appreciate it’s prudent and sensitive to a High Court case, but in terms of the specific notices that were issued in the first place I think they should be public knowledge.”

Labour Councillor James Humphreys said the Council is not getting the support from central government that it needs, and the PR campaign by the DAA and airlines is drowning out the noise, accusing them of publishing misinformation about airport operations.

Sinn Féin Councillor Ann Graves said that the Council is doing their job in terms of holding the DAA to account.

“It’s clear that they show contempt for our planning application on the basis that we’ll come back and ask them for additional information and push the process further down the line.”

She noted that the DAA and Ryanair are “outspoken” in the media.

“They’re not sitting here in this chamber, they’re not calling the shots, they’re not calling the shots in the planning office either” and she called the DAA out for their “delaying tactics.”

“We challenged them for not engaging with citizen groups, they shrugged their shoulders and said they’ve ticked a box, we’ve met with you. I think they are a bit contemptuous of the council.”