The Malta Environment and Planning Authority gave the go-ahead yesterday for the development of a controlled landfill at a site known as Ghallis ta’ Gewwa, in the vicinity of the Maghtab dump which was closed down in 2004.

The permit was issued for the development of a controlled landfill for non-hazardous and non-inert waste with a capacity of 1.7 million cubic metres and the development of a controlled landfill for hazardous waste with a capacity of 100,000 cubic metres.

The vote to grant the permit was unanimous.

The development was permitted within the context of a larger project that will involve the rehabilitation of the former Maghtab landfill, together with the closure and eventual rehabilitation of the Zwejra landfill, which was used as a short-term landfill until yesterday’s permit was granted.

In accordance with European legislation, Malta is committed to improve waste recovery and recycling levels and to reducing the volume of waste deposited to landfill. A landfill facility is required to handle municipal, commercial and industrial waste that cannot be disposed off otherwise.

The landfill is expected to receive around 250,000 tonnes of municipal waste every year, which is the amount of waste produced by the country at present. It will be split up in two cells: one for hazardous waste and the other for non-hazardous waste.

The site is situated within a slightly degraded rural landscape. Land use consists of a mixture of cultivated agricultural land, abandoned farmland and non-agricultural land, including degraded garigue areas. It is estimated that around 20 tumuli of land will be lost due to this development. The owners of the land in question, 11 in all, will be compensated by the developers – WasteServ Malta.

Around Lm250,000 have already been paid out to owners whose land is going to be used for the landfill.

The closest property to the site is 250 metres away with the Coastline Hotel 900 metres away. Other residences in Qawra and Salina are 1.2 kilometres away.

The Environmental Impact Assessment conducted before the permit was granted took into consideration alternative sites but all of them but one were automatically dropped due to their small size. Ghallis and Benghajsa were short-listed, but the latter was needed by the Freeport.

The Benghajsa site would also have been on the flight path of aircraft on approach to the Malta International Airport and this was why it was not chosen.

An estimated 1.3 million cubic metres of land will be excavated to make way for the controlled landfill, also known as an engineered landfill. Most of this material will be used in the process to treat the waste and cover it when it is placed inside the landfill. At the end of the process, and when the site is full, it will be covered with one metre of soil and rehabilitated.

Trucks transporting waste will not be allowed to drive past Maghtab village but will have to drive along the coast road. This issue was raised by Maghtab residents and Mepa upheld their request.