Diageo Ireland hold an industrial emissions licence (Reg. No. P0301-04), issued by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), for their brewing activity that is taking place at their site at St James’s Gate, Dublin 8. The licence sets monitoring requirements and limits for noise (daytime, evening and night-time) within which they must operate. The EPA is responsible for the enforcement of the IE licence.
The EPA received complaints regarding noise nuisance which have been alleged to result from Diageo Ireland (St. James’s Gate) brewing activities. The EPA determined that Diageo Ireland is not operating within the limits for noise (evening and night-time) included in their industrial emissions licence (IE licence Reg. No. P0301-04).
An EPA licence (P0301-01) was first granted to Diageo Ireland in July 2000 for the operation of their brewery installation. The licence was reviewed in July 2012 (P0301-02) to accommodate a roasting plant and reviewed again in April 2013 (P0301-03) to accommodate a significant brewing capacity expansion. The current licence (P0301-04) was issued August 2015 to accommodate a fourth roasting plant.
A copy of licence register No.P0301-04 including the application is available on the EPA website. You can also review annual environmental reports and other enforcement documentation such as site visit reports at this location.
The brewery covers an area of 24 hectares on either side of St James’s Street, Dublin 8. The main activities take place on the lower level of the site (to the North of James’s Street). The main production activities include raw material intake and storage, roasting of barley, brewhouse processes (including milling of malt and roast barley, mashing and boiling of the wort), fermentation plant processes, filtration, pasteurisation and packaging, transfer to bulk tankers for dispatch and production of concentrate in the Beverage Blending Agents (BBA) plant.
Since March 2020 the EPA has received numerous noise related complaints from residents living on Bonham Street and Watling Street in the vicinity of Diageo Ireland. Complaints have reported high pitched whining and humming noise during the daytime, evening time and night time as well as traffic noise during the daytime and evening time.
Noise monitoring completed at Watling and Bonham Street, by Diageo, in November 2019, March 2020 and October 2020 determined that the activities taking place at Diageo contribute to exceedances for both evening and night time noise limits. Noise monitoring completed in November 2020, December/January, February, March and April 2021 exceeded the night time noise limits. The observation was that Diageo Ireland’s operations including the combined heat and power (CHP) plant was the dominant source of noise. Diageo Ireland was issued with a notification of non-compliance for noise related breaches in March 2020 and for each subsequent non-compliant noise monitoring event.
In March 2020, the licensee was instructed to implement corrective measures to restore compliance with Conditions of their IE licence. The EPA identified tanker filling stations (TFS) and the combined heat and power plant (CHP) as noise sources during a site inspection in June 2020.
Since March 2020, Diageo Ireland implemented a phased programme of measures which included procedural and infrastructural improvements at the tanker filling stations, combined heat and power plant and traffic management to address noise at the Diageo Ireland installation. TFS Noise Reduction Management Plan and a CHP Plant Mitigation Plan (Phase I) was submitted to the EPA in 2020 with mitigation measures outlined in these plans successfully implemented onsite. Phase I attributed to reducing evening time noise level exceedances but did not result in compliance with the night time noise limits. The proposal for additional mitigation measures of the TFS and CHP plant (Phase II) was submitted to the EPA in January 2021, measures for Phase II are on-going and expected to be completed by end of May 2021.
The Agency maintains regular communication with Diageo Ireland on their progress in implementing measures to prevent noise off-site.
The EPA is responsible for enforcing industrial and waste licensed activities. Where the EPA forms the view that there are breaches of any licence that is not being addressed by the licensee, further enforcement action will be considered by the EPA in line with its enforcement policy.
Making Environmental Complaints
Make an environmental complaint to the EPA.
Supporting Documentation
The Licence and application documents and Licence enforcement documents for P0301-04 can be searched here.