On election eve Enemed does good on five-year-old promise to compensate Hal Farrug residents

Five years after government promised compensation, Hal Farrug residents will start receiving €500 annually as mitigation for the construction of large fuel tanks in their neighbourhood.

Residents only received a letter from Enemed, the State-owned fuel company, this week informing them of the compensation scheme. A few days before the European Parliament and local election are due, residents were told the monetary payment will apply to all households within a 500m radius of the fuel facility.

Earlier this year, Nationalist Party MEP candidate Peter Agius raised the plight of Hal Farrug residents with the European Commission since the fuel facility falls foul of the minimum 500m distance from residential neighbourhoods set out in the Seveso Directive. Agius had been applying pressure on the authorities over the negative impact of the facility on residents for the past few years.

The small community that lives at the edge of the airport perimeter has had to live in the shadow of three large steel tanks built in 2018 to store aviation fuel.

Residents were promised by Luqa Mayor John Schembri in 2019 that Enemed would be offering compensation of €500 per year for 20 years to each family once it invests in a solar farm. The company also bound itself to build a screen to hide the tanks. The local council did not object to the plans back then. The promise for compensation and mitigation measures was reiterated by then minister Konrad Mizzi and current Economy Minister Silvio Schembri.

But five years down the line none of the promises made to the residents were kept. Earlier this year, Enemed even told MaltaToday that the land earmarked for the solar farm was found to be unsuitable and instead the company would be turning the area into an ‘adventure park’.

In February this year, speaking during a TV interview, former prime minister Joseph Muscat had spoken of his regret over the construction of the fuel facility so close to residents’ houses.

A planning application to build a wall to screen the tanks was only filed this year and the company had said nothing about the promised monetary compensation when asked by this newspaper.

However, just this week, residents received a letter dated 31 May from Enemed informing them that the company would be offering compensation of €500 to all households within a 500m radius of the storage facility. The compensation would be paid annually for the next 20 years.

To receive the compensation, residents have to apply with Enemed by 30 September 2024.

In a statement on Thursday, PN MEP candidate Peter Agius welcomed the compensation but called it a short-term remedy. “Mere financial compensation is not enough in the longer term. Residents must also be given peace of mind for their security. I have already written to the European Commission on behalf of the residents to take action and if elected to the European Parliament, I will keep on pushing for implementation of EU standards in Malta, in safety but also with regard to our environment,” Agius said.

The three fuel tanks were constructed in 2018 by Enemed and replaced a much smaller storage facility on the same site that was originally built in the 1930s.

The new development came closer to the Hal Farrug residential area and the height of the tanks overshadowed people’s homes. Planning documents show that the new structures are approximately 23m high and “around four times as much” as the structures they replaced.