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15
Local investigation of atmospheric pollution.
We have had—in association with the Department of Scientific
and Industrial Research—a scheme whereby recording instruments
of various kinds were sited throughout the district. This scheme is
now some eight years old and as a result we have obtained a considerable
amount of information. It has, however, now been decided
that certain of the recording instruments might be re-sited and we
have accordingly taken in the lead peroxide candle from the Vicarage
at North Ockendon to Oglethorpe School and moved out the
deposit gauge from the school in Upminster Road, Rainham, to the
new school at Lambs Lane. Although these re-sitings are not of
major moment they will nevertheless furnish us with information
from a slightly different angle; they will enable a greater degree of
centralisation to be practised and they should in time prove advantageous.
In this connection it might be recorded that the County
Council have very recently sponsored a scheme which would seem
likely to provide a somewhat cheaper figure for analyses. As Hornchurch,
however, has had a scheme working smoothly for some 8½
years the Council decided that, whilst they would not of course close
the door to any alterations, they were not at present prepared to
interfere with our existing arrangements.
Sewerage.
Little progress falls to be recorded in connection with the
Regional Scheme save that our Ingrebourne sewer re-laying which
is progressing satisfactorily has been of a size adequately eventually
to fit in with the Regional Scheme.
So far as concerns the river Ingrebourne it is of course the
recipient of the effluent from the Nags Head Sewage Works situated
in a neighbouring area. It is I think both impossible and unnecessary
to indicate in detail the degree to which health might be prejudiced
by a sewage effluent traversing one's district even though on
occasion it may provide a major constituent of the 'River Ingrebourne'.
It is sufficient to say that sewage effluent is not designed
to be anything other than a desirable product of a sewage works
and even thus may be quite an undesirable element as the main
constituent of a so-called river.
Save at times of heavy rainfall it seems to me impossible for
the Nags Head effluent to secure really substantial dilution and it
would be well if everyone viewed this question in the light not of
whether it was a good effluent (and even on this point I would not
be prepared to be dogmatic) but whether it is in these modern times
really good enough as part of a river flowing through our district
from one end to the other. I think the time is not only ripe but
overdue for some other means to be found of dealing with the
effluent from this sewage works.