A legal challenge has been launched over Shropshire Council's decision to give planning permission for a new poultry unit near the River Severn.
The application for judicial review was initiated by law firm Leigh Day and is funded by environmental campaigning group River Action.
The council is being challenged over its decision in May to give planning permission for an application by LJ Cooke & Son for a poultry production unit.
This includes four poultry rearing buildings, each over 100m long, and a biomass store with boilers at North Farm, Felton Butler, Montford Bridge, Shropshire.
The unit would house 230,000 birds, just 400m from an existing poultry site which is believed to house nearly half a million birds.
Permission was initially refused after Natural England advised that three protected sites, Shrawardine Pool, Lin Can Moss and Fenemere, could “be sensitive to impacts for aerial pollutants”.
Council officers said the plan did not detail proposals for handling chicken manure without an anaerobic digester.
However, the plan was approved after LJ Cooke proposed exporting manure to a third party anaerobic digestion unit so that the digestate could be spread on farmland.
Alison Caffyn, the claimant who is a member of River Action, said: "We simply cannot allow the creation of more of these giant clusters of polluting poultry units. There are already well over 20 million chickens in Shropshire, we don’t need more.
"Before we know it, the River Severn will soon be suffering the same pollution load as the neighbouring Wye – all because of these misguided and ill-informed planning decisions by Shropshire Council.”
Ricardo Gama, a Leigh Day?solicitor added: “Our client hopes that her claim for judicial review will set a precedent for local authorities across the country determining planning applications for similar developments which will cumulatively have severe impacts on protected sites.
"She believes that there needs to be a complete rethink of this approach.”
It comes as River Action campaigners are currently waging a legal fight against chicken producer Avara Foods in the River Wye catchment area.
Leigh Day, which is again involved, sent a ‘letter before action’ to the company earlier this week, which also include Avara's subsidiary Freemans of Newent and Avara’s 50% shareholder, Cargill Plc.
