VIRIDOR is considering making a planning application to extend the Heathfield landfill site which 'in a worst case scenario' could reach capacity by 2007.

This was revealed by a senior Devon County Council officer at a public meeting in Kingsteignton on Tuesday, along with the fact that a new access road could be built to the controversy-plagued site.

Both announcements will alert environmental campaigners already concerned at the effects they say the tip is having on local people, and by the amount of traffic using the site.

The news was given by Stewart Redding, Devon's waste disposal officer, during the meeting at which he outlined the first draft of the county waste plan.

With European directives insisting on a reduction in the amount of landfill – the figure must be 35 per cent of the 1995 level by 2020 – other means of waste disposal would have to be found, he said.

If the targets issued by Brussels were not met he was not sure what the penalties would be.

'But I'm sure they'll be quite onerous,' he said.

Capacity remaining at the Heathfield site was 1.2 cubic metres, almost exactly the same amount as the predicted shortfall in landfill capacity in the south Devon area by the end of the local plan period in about 2016.

But in a worst-case scenario that capacity could be reached by 2007, he admitted.

Mr Redding stressed to concerned residents and meeting coordinator Cllr Joan Lambert that Babcombe Copse, near the site, was not

a suitable site for

landfill.

But the Heathfield site formed 'an important part of the jigsaw of waste management' in Devon and that situation was likely to continue.

The waste plan shows that Watts Blake Bearne has planning permission for a realignment of the B3193 as an extension of John Acres Lane, which could improve access to the site.

But Cllr Lambert wanted to know what the noise was going to be like from the road if it was built on top of a massive mound of clay waste.

She urged everyone concerned at the issues to work together.

'Working as a community you can get more done than by standing up and yelling your head off,' she said.

Campaigner Diane Irwin said the site should more accurately be described as landrise than landfill as it was growing to a height above the trees, and being brought to a level of the mountain to which Mrs Lambert had referred.

Friends of the Earth were extremely worried about it, she said.

The tip found itself in the centre of the media spotlight, two years

ago, when it accepted animal carcasses from the welfare cull during the foot and mouth outbreak.

Then accusing fingers were pointed in the direction of the tip by Kingsteignton residents who claimed that flies and smells from it were adversely affecting their health.