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14
Clean Air Act, 1956:
During the year two applications in connection with the furnace
arrangements were received under Section 3. One of these was approved;
one was refused. In each case the advice of the National Industrial
Fuel Efficiency Service was sought before a final decision was made.
Observations Scheme:
No change has taken place in the number or distribution of the
various instruments which we operate for day-to-day atmospheric
findings. These remain at three Deposit Gauges at "Langtons,"
Hornchurch; Lambs Lane School, Rainham and Oglethorpe School,
Cranham; four Lead Peroxide Candles at "Langtons," Hornchurch,
Lambs Lane School, Rainham, Oglethorpe School, Cranham and Redden
Court School, Harold Wood and one Volumetric SO2 apparatus sited at
the Public Health Department, Billet Lane.
An "Eel" Reflectometer has been purchased which will enable
future smoke stains to be read much more accurately and with an
elimination of the error which inevitably must characterise non-automatic
readings.
It can clearly be argued that the pollution in arry district is either
the result of drift from outside or the result of locally produced pollution
through either (a) industry or allied causes or (b) housing. Hornchurch
is no exception. So far as concerns external sources you have of course
no control over them. So far as concerns local industry it is in my
view a negligible producer of smoke. So far as concerns housing I
think that cumulatively it produces a substantial amount of smoke. This
is a story from which the deductions need be neither difficult nor
confused.
Sewerage.
The Surveyor informs me that 4.1 miles of soil sewer and 4.1 miles
of surface water sewer were laid during the year.
Cesspools.
The cesspool position received general discussion last year and
as the same criteria appear relevant still it is not proposed again to
dwell on it. It is, however, clear that the replacement of cesspools by
main drainage is fully understood to be a matter of fundamental policy
and although present restrictions do not facilitate any wide-spread
improvements of this kind the sooner householders with cesspools in
urban areas can be given the option of such replacement the better.
When that time comes it should also be largely unnecessary to have
cesspools as part of the normal provision of new houses. It is certain
that this is the ideal which the Council would wish to secure and if
the occupiers of houses with cesspools do not perhaps always see eye
to eye with them initially it is pretty certain that after a year or two
experience will have made them converts to this viewpoint.