The Labour party is set to unveil more details of its plans to devolve powers away from Westminster, Byline Times understands.

Some details of the proposals are expected to be outlined in a speech by the party's Deputy Leader Angela Rayner later this week.

The intervention follows notable tensions between the Labour leader and England's two most high-profile elected Mayors, Sadiq Khan and Andy Burnham.

Khan and Starmer clashed last summer over the London mayor's plans to implement a now-enacted low emission zone in outer London, while Burnham has criticised Starmer's decision to U-turn on his plans for green investment and House of Lords reform.

Starmer's appearance earlier this week alongside Khan for the launch of the London Mayor’s re-election campaign marked an apparent attempt to heal divisions after a period of real tensions between the two politicians.

The Labour leader’s very public criticism of Khan’s flagship decision to bring in an Ultra Low Emission Zone in Outer London last summer was met with significant anger by some of those around the Mayor.

At the time, sources close to Khan expressed frustration at Starmer’s decision to attack a policy which by that point was just weeks away from being rolled out. They also warned that Starmer’s intervention risked giving oxygen to the Conservative party’s anti-ULEZ campaign in the then upcoming Uxbridge by-election.

Their warning appeared to pan out, with the Conservatives pulling off a surprise win in Uxbridge and Rishi Sunak using the result as justification to ditch much of his own Government’s green agenda. Half a year on and Khan believes his original policy has been vindicated.

“When we brought in ULEZ in central London there were people who were very hostile and anti and the truth is that the sky didn’t fall in” Khan told this paper.

“And the great news is that 19 out of 20 cars seen driving into [the new zone] now on an average day are compliant [with ULEZ]… and this has transformed the air in our city.”

Repairing Relations

The two men’s appearance at a London community centre on Monday appeared to be attempt to move on from the row.

It was particularly notable that in his speech, Starmer praised his “friend" Khan's agenda on cleaning up London’s air, saying that “I say to people who challenge me on cleaner air, I’ve got two kids. They’re 15 and 13. I wouldn’t give them dirty water to drink and I wouldn’t want them to breathe in dirty air.”

However, he failed to specifically endorse the ULEZ policy. A spokesman for Starmer later told this paper that the Labour leaders’s view on the policy “hasn't changed”.

A source close to Khan admitted that relations between City Hall and the Labour leader's office had been strained by the ULEZ row. 

Other policy differences do still remain between Khan and Starmer.

An example of these came on Monday when Starmer was asked about Khan’s proposals to implement a form of rent controls in London. The Labour leader poured cold water on the idea, saying that “it’s not our policy at the moment.”

However, despite these ongoing differences, Khan’s team retain hope that a Starmer Government could prove pivotal for London.

Over the past eight years Khan has been a regular target of successive Conservative Governments, who have tightly held the purse strings on new London infrastructure projects. Khan's recent treatment by former Conservative Chairman Lee Anderson, who was accused of making a series of Islamophobic comments about the London mayor, was seen as emblematic of this.

City Hall hope that a relations with central government would be transformed if Starmer enters Downing Street.

In particular Khan's campaign pledge to build tens of thousands of new council homes is seen as lining up with the party's own national proposals to increase housebuilding.

Yet as well as being potentially more amenable to investing in London, Khan is also pinning his hopes on an incoming Labour Prime Minister handing over big new powers to the Mayor.

“I'm really optimistic about the next Labour government devolving more powers and resources to the cities and regions,” Khan told this paper.

“The key things we’re talking about are in relation to planning, skills and the economy.”

Khan pointed to proposals by the London Finance Commission to give the Mayor new powers to raise infrastructure funding as the sort of proposals he would be lobbying Starmer to adopt in office.

“We've done the heavy lifting on this so we're hoping in the first 100 days that you'll see the fruits of [those proposals].”

A spokesman for Starmer told this paper that the Labour leader accepted “the need for more powers for regional mayors” on areas including skills and welfare.

Devolution 2.0?

Labour proposals to devolve additional powers to the Mayor were set out in a report for the party by Gordon Brown two years ago, but little has been confirmed since.

However, with a general election looming later this year, Labour sources suggested that some details of these new devolution proposals would be set out by the party’s deputy leader Angela Rayner during a speech later this week.

Labour's devolution proposals are unlikely to be as impactful as anything pursued by Tony Blair during his first term as Prime Minister, however. The big wave of devolution rolled out by the then Labour Prime Minister was transformative, creating devolved government in both Scotland and Wales, as well as rolling out regional mayors and authorities across England.

Little proposed so far by Starmer appears to match that level of ambition, with previous plans for a new “senate of the regions” to replace the House of Lords, also reportedly being reconsidered by Starmer’s team.

However, with Labour dampening down expectations of big new spending proposals, the devolution agenda poses an opportunity for an incoming Starmer government to make real differences to the political landscape of the UK, at relatively little expense.

It could also help to contrast with the failure of the Government's own promise to "level up" the country. A Parliamentary report last week found that 90% of projects promised by former Prime Minister Boris Johnson remained years away from completion.

A spokesman for Starmer told journalists on Wednesday that the party would ditch the phrase "levelling up" if they form the next Government.

Seven-year-old Zane Gbangbola and his family lived in a semi-detached Victorian house in Chertsey, Surrey, between the River Thames and what appeared to be an attractive lake, just the other side of the field that their home backed onto. To all appearances, it was an idyllic spot in a desirable greenbelt location.

Zane’s parents, Kye and Nicole Gbangbola, were both successful young professionals and their only child was a bright, lively boy, popular at his school and in the church community to which Kye and Nicole belonged.

But in January and February 2014, the heaviest rainfall since Met Office records began – the first climatic event attributed to climate change by a UK prime minister – showed the grim downside of living so close to water for many thousands of people in southern England.

Homes were inundated from Cornwall to Kent, rail lines were washed away and, on 5 February, amid mounting criticism that the Government was failing to get to grips with the crisis, Prime Minister David Cameron held the first of a series of COBRA meetings.

Two days later, in the early hours of 8 February, the happy lives of Zane and his family were shattered forever.

Kye and Nicole’s home had never been inundated before, and it had a flood basement designed to protect from this risk. As the torrential rain continued in that first week of February, this was doing what it was meant to do – collecting floodwater that had overflowed from the nearby lake, which Kye and Nicole were pumping out with electric pumps. They had also hired a petrol-driven pump, but only used this for a short period in the morning of 7 February to set it up and test that it would work if needed as a back-up.

All members of the family had been feeling unwell in the previous few days, but believed this was due to seasonal infections.

That evening, Kye took Zane with him to a local residents’ meeting calling for councillors to do more to protect vulnerable residents from the impacts of flooding. Afterwards, they returned home and Zane enjoyed the treat of watching the opening ceremony of the 2014 Winter Olympics on TV. 

After he had been put to bed, Kye used the bedroom next to his son’s to work on his computer. He and Nicole were taking it in turns to be on “floodwatch” during the night, to check that the electric pumps were working to protect their home.

At around 3.30am, Nicole checked on Zane and found he was not breathing. She tried desperately to resuscitate him while waiting for an ambulance but neither she nor the paramedics could revive him. Zane was pronounced dead in hospital a short time later.

A second ambulance crew found Kye unconscious and in cardiac arrest in the room where he had been working, less than two metres from Zane’s room. He regained consciousness in hospital but had lost all sensation and power in his legs. Kye was later told that he would never walk again.

Hydrogen Cyanide

Exactly what caused Zane’s death and left his father in a wheelchair was, two-and-a-half years later, the subject of an inquest that many now believe failed to properly examine the strong evidence that points towards a deadly chemical culprit: hydrogen cyanide, conducted into the family's home along with water from the nearby lake that had, unbeknown to them, previously been a landfill site for all manner of waste materials.

The coroner found that, “on the balance of probabilities”, Zane was killed by carbon monoxide from the petrol-driven pump, despite Kye and Nicole’s denials that this was used that night – and despite the fact that officers of Surrey Fire and Rescue Service’s specialist HAZMAT team, which arrived at the family’s home at 4:30am that morning, found that the pump was cold and showed no sign of recent use.

The HAZMAT team detected no unusual levels of carbon monoxide within the house, but its specialised equipment did detect hydrogen cyanide at potentially dangerous levels – not once but three times.

Several other anomalies throw doubt on the coroner’s conclusions.

The carbon monoxide found in Zane’s blood was well below levels that would normally be fatal or cause serious symptoms. The Environment Agency national incident recording system classified the 25,000ppm reading for hydrogen cyanide, as reported by the fire crew, as "very high", and Kye and Nicole were advised not to return to the house for over a year, even to collect belongings. And in July 2014, a leading neurophysiologist ascribed Kye’s paralysing condition as being “due to hydrogen cyanide”.

Since 2014, Kye and Nicole have fought tirelessly for a full, independent panel inquiry into what happened that night. They have gathered an impressive body of evidence as well as support from unions including the Fire Brigades Union, the Communication Workers’ Union and UNISON, environmental scientists, local councillors, and many prominent politicians including Keir Starmer, Andy Burnham, David Lammy, Jess Phillips, Jeremy Corbyn and Caroline Lucas.

A petition by the 'Truth About Zane’ campaign calling for an independent investigation has been signed by 118,000 people.

Earlier this month, an Early Day Motion signed by 32 MPs called for an independent panel inquiry with full powers to compel disclosure into Zane’s death. It noted that “the victims and bereaved in this case have been blamed, abused and scapegoated” and that there had been a “lack of proper investigation” with “masses of evidence undisclosed or ignored and a flawed judicial outcome”.

The MPs also drew attention to a particularly shocking aspect of the case: “Zane’s family were refused legal aid for his inquest, whilst legal support for public officials was paid from the public purse and the coroner received legal aid.” This denial of so-called 'parity of arms’ meant that Zane’s parents have been faced with a steeply unlevel playing field in legal terms.

'Ticking Time Bombs’

During the past few years, evidence has emerged that strongly suggests the landfill site next to the family’s home, which had later been turned into that pretty lake, had previously been used to dispose of highly toxic material.

In 2020, a Ministry of Defence whistleblower told the BBC that chemical waste from an MoD research facility had been dumped in metal drums into gravel pits around Chertsey, including the one from which floodwater entered Kye and Nicole’s home.

This tallied with evidence uncovered in planning documents for an aviation fuel pipeline, which revealed that a borehole sunk into the gravel pit in 1972 (before it was flooded later that decade) had struck “a metal canister... which released a substance that effervesced with water in the borehole and gave rise to an 'obnoxious smell’”.

What happened to Zane and his family in 2014 also highlights a growing danger faced by many others who live near old landfill sites.

In 2021, independent environmental analysts the ENDS Report found that there are around 21,000 such sites across England and Wales. Of these, 1,287 are categorised as containing waste that would be hazardous to human health if it escaped. Very few of these sites are known to have been properly lined to stop residues being released.

An earlier government study into the link between birth defects and proximity to landfill sites found that 80% of the British population lives with two kilometres of such a site (it also found that incidence of birth defects and low birth weight increased with proximity, though causation could not be established with certainty).

Mapping by the Ends Report shows that 9% of such potentially dangerous sites lie directly under housing and 4% under commercial areas containing shops and restaurants. A further 45% of such sites are under green spaces or parkland. Nearly 750 are within 500 metres of bodies of water and 1,364 are in zones at risk of tidal flooding.

Like Zane’s family, most people who live close to these sites have no idea that they are there or of the potential dangers they may pose. This is not surprising, as information about historic landfills is by no means easy to come by.

Although the Environment Agency keeps records, these are, by its own admission, “not detailed” and often it is simply not known what materials may have been buried within these sites. Nor, in many cases, is it clear who is responsible for making sure that they are safe.

Such landfills may contain anything from household waste to industrial sludge, asbestos, toxic mining waste, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (linked to a range of cancers) and polychlorinated biphenyls (linked to altered thyroid and reproductive function and increased risk of cardiovascular and liver disease, and to diabetes). Some sites are even thought to contain toxic materials from the UK’s historic chemical weapons programme.

Dr Paul Johnston, a specialist in environmental toxicity at Exeter University’s Greenpeace Research Laboratories, has described these landfills as “ticking time bombs”, noting that: “With the climate crisis set to bring more flooding and coastal erosion to the UK, some of these sites are at even higher risk of leaking their toxic contents. This is a difficult and costly problem to tackle, but we're going to have to do it at some point, or there'll be some nasty surprises in store."

Earlier this month, it was revealed that research undertaken on “a number of different operational and closed landfills” for the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and the Environment Agency had found 17 of these to be leaking highly toxic substances containing banned and potentially carcinogenic “forever chemicals” – in some cases at levels 260 times higher than is deemed safe for drinking water.

Zane’s Law

As the Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill reached committee stage in the House of Lords last year, Green Party Baroness Natalie Bennett drew the attention of her fellow peers to plans to build homes on two former landfill sites known to have been used to dispose of highly toxic materials (in Coseley, near Dudley, and in the village of Somercotes in Derbyshire).

She sketched out the history of regulation of such sites, pointing out that “EU regulations on waste and pollution came in through the Environmental Protection Act 1990, tightening up controls. In particular, Section 143 provided an obligation for local authorities to investigate their area and draw up public registers of land that may be contaminated. Section 31 of that Act also gave local authorities powers to inspect and close landfills and clean them up if necessary”.

But, as the peer explained, these sections of the 1990 Act were never properly implemented, with the justification given for this being that it was about “the cost and desire not to place ‘new regulatory burdens’ on the private sector”. Later, the Cameron Government’s so-called “bonfire of red tape” had further reduced the right of authorities to use the law to enforce clean-up of these sites.

With this – and the horrific experience of Zane’s family – in mind, Baroness Bennett proposed an amendment to the Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill, which would place a duty on local authorities to report on land contamination in their areas, and for the Secretary of State to publish a nationwide review of the incidence of such contamination, identifying the resources and any legal changes needed to bring all potentially hazardous sites in England to safe levels.

Baroness Bennett proposed that this amendment be known as Zane’s Law.

It did not succeed in making it into the Act as passed but, with climate change driving an increasingly severe risk of flooding around such historic landfill sites, the need for stronger regulation is becoming ever more urgent.

“Surely, a basic duty of the Government is to ensure the security of people in their own homes, which, quite frankly, they are unable to do now because they are not empowering, directing and resourcing local authorities to ensure that they know what is in their land,” Baroness Bennett told the House of Lords.

This week, Zane’s parents have launched a petition for a change in the law, with Lewes Council becoming the first in England to pass a motion calling for a Zane’s Law.

Green Lewes councillor Imogen Makepeace said: “We hope that in passing this motion of support for Zane’s Law, our council will be paving the way for more local authorities to take up the call. Many thousands of people live near such potentially dangerous former landfill sites and are entirely unaware of the risks that they pose.”

Any change in the law will come too late for Zane and his family. But it can’t come soon enough for many others who face the growing risk from landfill’s toxic legacy.

Ten years ago, when Michael Hall retired as dean of students at the Pacific Northwest College of Art and began to spend more time at home, he noticed an ear-splitting noise — something he’d never been around during the day to hear. “The neighbor’s contractor was rattling my windows and assaulting my ears!” he says. One day, he went out and met the contractor at the curb and said, “Can you dial back on the leaf blower? There’s only 10 feet between our houses and it’s really a nuisance.” The contractor responded, “If you kept better care of that side of your house, I wouldn’t have to do that.”  

That launched Hall on a mission that he’s still leading to this day. “At first I started out as Don Quixote out there, tilting at windmills,” says Hall, who describes himself as an old Berkeley hippie. Today he’s not only a co-chair of Quiet Clean PDX, a grassroots organization that’s pushing to ban the use of gas-powered leaf blowers city-wide, but part of a growing national movement. More than 100 US cities have banned gas-powered leaf blowers and over 45 different organizations across the country are part of the Quiet Clean Alliance, from Quiet Clean Philly to Quiet Clean Seattle.  

Michael Hall. Courtesy of Quiet Clean PDX

Not only do gas-powered leaf blowers create extreme noise pollution — the most powerful can produce sounds of up to 100 decibels of low-frequency noise, around the same as a Boeing 737 taking off — they are also an environmental menace and a threat to human health. Most have what’s called a “two-stroke engine,” an outmoded design that burns a mix of gas and oil (for lubrication). It’s been shown that because this type of equipment doesn’t have catalytic converters, only two-thirds of the gas and oil mix is burned as fuel. The rest is emitted as toxic fumes of nitrogen oxides and volatile organic compounds (VOCs), two of the main ingredients in ground-level ozone, which both trigger asthma attacks and contribute to premature death. In fact, according to the California Air Resources Board, a single operator using a gas leaf blower for one hour generates the same smog-forming emissions as one car driving 1,100 miles. These small devices also leak formaldehyde and benzene, both of which are known carcinogens. And the people who are most impacted by these toxic fumes? The lawn care workers who use them, many of whom are from lower socio-economic backgrounds. After that, children, the elderly and anyone who is ill are the most impacted — and unlike landscapers, they aren’t wearing protective gear. 

Finally, these relatively small devices also emit tons (literally) of carbon dioxide, the leading cause of global warming. According to the latest data from the EPA, fossil fuel-powered lawn equipment (including not just leaf blowers but trimmers, mowers, weedwackers, etc.) emits 30 million tons of carbon dioxide in the US each year — more than the amount of greenhouse gases that Los Angeles produced in 2021. 

The high-decibel noise pollution of a gas-powered leaf blower is not just obnoxious and disruptive; it can actually cause tinnitus and hearing loss for the workers who use them (or anyone who is close to one for a full hour). In an article in The Atlantic about his antipathy to gas-powered leaf blowers, journalist (and former Jimmy Carter speechwriter) James Fallows explained why the low-frequency buzz of these devices is especially insidious. “Low-frequency noise has a great penetrating power: It goes through walls, cement barriers, and many kinds of hearing-protection devices,” writes Fallows. The upshot is that even if crews are wearing ear protection, they’ll likely suffer hearing loss after long-term repeated use. 

A single operator using a gas-powered leaf blower for one hour generates the same smog-forming emissions as one car driving 1,100 miles. Credit: Bob Pool / Shutterstock

When it comes to changing the status quo, California is in the lead, as usual, being the first state to require manufacturers to make zero-emission lawn equipment including leaf blowers, lawn mowers and other small off-road lawn equipment. (The law went into effect this month). Though the law doesn’t ban existing gas-powered leaf blowers or lawn mowers, the California legislature has also allocated $30 million in incentives for individuals and landscaping businesses to make the switch to zero-emission lawn equipment. 

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Cities from Burlington, Vermont to Evantston, Illinois have banned the sale and use of gas-powered leaf blowers along with one county: Montgomery County, Maryland. At least 25 cities across California have enacted legislation to regulate or ban gas-powered leaf blowers including Oakland, Beverly Hills and Santa Barbara.  

But the gold standard, according to Hall from Quiet Clean PDX, is Quiet Clean D.C. James Fallows and Chuck Elkins, former director of the Noise Control Program at the EPA, led the charge years ago and after a three-year phase-in, the ban finally went into effect in 2022. By all accounts, it has been successful. What sets Washington, D.C.’s ban apart is its broad prohibition of gas-powered blowers (it is both illegal to use them and illegal to sell them in District stores); a three-year ramp-up that allowed for education and compliance; and no-nonsense enforcement. According to Hall, “They’ve got it set up where a citizen affidavit can be filed to the Department of Licensing and Consumer Protection and then the Department sends, at first, a warning. They didn’t want it to be punitive, they wanted it to be an educational issue for the mow and blow guys,” he says. After that first warning, fines of up to $500 are issued. 

Electric leaf blowers are expensive — but once you have one, you never have to buy oil or gas again. Credit: JacZia / Shutterstock

There are many arguments against the bans. Some landscapers argue that the electric blowers aren’t as powerful. Others complain about the expense of buying all new equipment. Hall from Quiet Clean PDX understands that people have a deep relationship with their tools and may be reluctant to part with them. But he points out that there’s also an economic benefit to converting. It costs about $2,000 to get a top-of-the-line electric leaf blower (including charger and batteries), but the return on investment is only a year or two at most. After that, you never have to buy gasoline or oil again. 

The Santa Cruz Coalition for a Healthy & Safe Environment recently published a study on the economics of switching and found that even in the most expensive scenario, for a high-performance Stihl battery blower, the savings are significant. Though the up-front cost of this device is $2,261 (including tax), the coalition found, a positive return on investment is seen in just 10.5 months. By the end of the second year, using the electric blower would already have saved $2,904.  

Nick Seagraves, who runs Seagraves Landscaping in West Linn, Oregon, has been a landscaper for 40 years. He only started using electric devices a few years ago, mostly because Lake Oswego’s Department of Parks & Recreation (a client) required it. He has a crew of 14 and says that his guys like the electric blowers. “They actually prefer them,” he admits. That said, he says that even the Husqvarna electric models he purchased don’t put out quite as much energy as the gas blowers. But now that he has them, he says homeowner associations that have long been clients really appreciate them. “It gives us an edge,” he says. 

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Many cities (including D.C. and Dallas) are offering rebates or trade-in programs for quieter and less polluting electric blowers, which helps lessen the initial cost of switching over. On January 1 of this year, a new law went into effect in Colorado giving residents a 30 percent discount on all electric lawn mowers, leaf blowers, trimmers, and snow blowers.

Back in Portland, Quiet Clean PDX is working to get Portland City Council to vote on the issue this year. Does Hall hope that Quiet Clean PDX will eventually take up the crusade against electric leaf blowers, too? Even though they don’t emit benzene or VOCs, they still generate propulsive wind speeds of up to 200 miles per hour, stirring up ultrafine particles of demolition debris, fecal matter, pollens, pesticides, dirt and debris, and industrial pollutants. 

Courtesy of the Xerces Society

Hall is philosophical. “Yes, it would be great to Make America Rake Again,” he says. He is a proponent of Leave the Leaves, a campaign initiated by the Xerces Society, a nonprofit committed to protecting pollinators and other invertebrates. Pollinators, it turns out, find their homes in leaves that are a few inches thick. “We’ve had a tremendous uptick in birds since we started leaving the leaves,” Hall says. 

But Hall’s main focus is eliminating gas-powered blowers. Though he started out most offended by the devices’ noise pollution, he’s now more panicked about the carbon dioxide they emit. “It’s an existential issue right now,” Hall says. 

“I’ve become oddly more incremental in my thinking,” he says. He points to a quote by Martin Luther King, Jr.: “If I cannot do great things, I can do small things in a great way.” 

“If my contribution can be getting off the polluting, death-creating bottom line with lawn equipment,” Hall says, “that’s what I’d like to do with the remainder of my life.”  

The post The Movement to ‘Make America Rake Again’ appeared first on Reasons to be Cheerful.

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The Northern Ireland Environment Agency – housed within the devolved Department of Agriculture, the Environment and Rural Affairs – introduced a “pause” on 38 planning applications for livestock farming and biogas plant developments earlier this year.

But it has lifted this temporary suspension to processing applications despite not having changed the wording of the advice on ammonia levels that it issues to Northern Ireland's 11 councils which rule on the plans, Byline Times can reveal.

Campaigners say that DAERA may now risk inviting various forms of legal action, with one claiming a top NIEA scientist had warned publicly that it was vulnerable to such action only four years ago.

Ninety-eight per cent of protected habitats in Northern Ireland are estimated to be exceeding critical thresholds of ammonia – the point at which ecological damage occurs – by up to as much as 300%.

Scientists and public health experts have consequently dubbed Northern Ireland “ammonia land” and warned that its current emissions levels pose serious dangers to protected plant species (such as sphagnum moss, which acts as a carbon sink), as well as to human health.

The NIEA announcement comes as two separate probes are under way into more than 100 applications for new pig and poultry developments, as well as for biogas plant facilities. The investigations are examining the widespread use of falsified soil samples in applications.

DAERA told Byline Times that none of the 38 “paused” applications were ones in which falsified documentation was suspected to have been used.

A "pause" on issuing ammonia advice for livestock unit planning applications was announced in May, as the Office for Environmental Protection (OEP) watchdog announced its first ever NI investigation, assessing whether this government advice has been lawful.

Of the 38 suspended applications, the highest number were in the Causeway Coast and Glens Borough Council area, where seven were highlighted by the NIEA. Five were suspended in both the Lisburn and Castlereagh City Council and Derry City and Strabane District Council areas.

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With the aim of beefing up its regulatory regime, the OEP’s remit was extended to Northern Ireland last year. But campaigners argue its ability to adequately investigate DAERA may be limited by the fact DAERA funds the regulator. The watchdog has stressed that its ammonia advice probe will be not impacted by this funding arrangement.

It is now questioning how the NIEA has taken the step of lifting its pause amid the OEP probe, without having altered the text of the advice it issues to councils which prompted the watchdog’s investigation over questions of lawfulness.

“Ammonia pollution is in the top five of the greatest threats to nature in Northern Ireland but of even more concern is the grave threat to public health,” James Orr, director of Friends of the Earth NI, told Byline Times.

“The polluted air is literally killing people. DAERA has known for years its ammonia protocol is vulnerable to legal challenge yet it is going back to the bad old days of caving into pressure from agri-food corporations.

“DAERA's failure to deal with water pollution has led to the dying of Lough Neagh. Now we are seeing the same reckless attitude to air pollution. Yet again, they are protecting polluters instead of protecting the air we breathe.”

Lough Neagh, the biggest freshwater body across the UK and Ireland in surface area, has been blighted by a resurgent blue-green algae bloom over the summer and autumn months. Locals say it is the “worst” they have ever seen, following years of farm-source nutrient overload.

Around 62% of the lough’s phosphate inputs are estimated to come from agricultural run-off, while 24% is thought to come from human sewage discharges within the lough’s vast catchment area.

Geraint Ellis, a professor at Queen’s University Belfast’s School of Natural and Built Environment, said the NIEA’s decision raised questions around transparency and lawfulness.

“Although pausing these planning applications may cause some difficulties for the applicants, the overriding public interest is to make sure they are assessed thoroughly and that we are sure that they do not exacerbate existing environmental problems," he told Byline Times.

“Given the significance of this issue, the high level of public concern over water quality in bodies such as Lough Neagh, and a declining confidence in the planning system, I find it remarkable that there is a lack of transparency about why this pause has been lifted. This lack of clarity will only fuel suspicions over the regulatory capture by big business.

“Although we do not know the full circumstances of why this pause is lifted, a lack of explanation significantly increases the risk of a legal challenge on this decision.”

A spokesperson for DAERA said: “NIEA took a decision in May to temporarily pause the issuing of ammonia planning advice while senior officials considered the use of the advice.

“Having considered the current situation in the context of the Northern Ireland (Executive Formation etc) Act 2022, as amended by the Northern Ireland (Interim Arrangements) Act 2023, NIEA determined that there is not sufficient additional information or evidence, that wasn’t already available to the minister when he gave instructions for officials to continue to apply the operational protocol, to make a new decision that would change or set aside the policy/instructions set out by the former minister.

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“Therefore, the pause has been lifted and NIEA has resumed offering advice based on the extant ammonia standing advice/protocol.”

Industry groups such as the Ulster Farmers’ Union have campaigned extensively since the “pause” was introduced by the NIEA to the applications for livestock farming and biogas plant developments.

Biomethane has just been introduced into Northern Ireland’s gas network for the first time, following a sustained period of industry lobbying.

A Stormont official’s note from more than a decade ago pointed out that the by-product of the anaerobic digestion process – which converts organic material to biomethane gas – does not address Northern Ireland’s emissions problems since this by-product, digestate, still contains high levels of ammonia and other harmful contaminants.

A Source Material investigation since then has also suggested that biogas plant deals struck by major firms like Moy Park with DAERA have allowed new poultry farms to “bypass detailed scrutiny of their impact on sensitive habitats”.

The OEP told Byline Times it had “noted” the NIEA’s decision to lift the “pause” on livestock applications and is considering its next steps.

Helen Venn, the OEP’s chief regulatory officer, said: “Our investigation into the ammonia advice DAERA provides to councils considering applications for certain livestock installations (known as the operational protocol) is ongoing. We have noted the NIEA’s decision to lift the pause on its provision of ammonia planning advice based on the operational protocol. We have a number of options available under our powers and duties and we are considering these as we continue our investigation.”

James Orr urged the watchdog to consider a legal challenge “as a matter of urgency” and said that, amid an almost two-year hiatus of devolved government, “DAERA has gone rogue”.

“This is also a huge insult to the OEP who announced they are investigating the application of the ammonia protocol in Northern Ireland yet DAERA have not had the decency to wait until that investigation is complete," he added. “Pollution is only going to get so much worse unless the OEP intervenes as a matter of urgency. They have the power to judicially review DAERA and this must be considered as a matter of urgency.

“It feels that even without ministers, DAERA has gone rogue. It is failing to comply with its legal duties and is playing Russian Roulette with the health of nature and with people’s health.”