EPA lacks the expertise to enforce environmental regulations, expert claims

ONE of Ireland’s foremost experts on the chemical industry believes the Environmental Protection Agency has neither the expertise nor the resources to fully monitor and enforce environmental regulations within the industry.

Peter North, a consulting chemical process engineer with 35 years' experience, said yesterday that both the attitude and the structures of the EPA must change to ensure a better service.

“How can a nine to five operation be of any use? It is after five that things happen,” he said.