Boaters stopping at Sharpness Marina on the River Severn claim the smell coming from a nearby compost factory is ruining their summer cruising.

Staff and visitors at the marina say the odour is so strong that they have been forced to keep windows closed, even on the hottest days.

“At times the smell was pretty pungent,” said the marina manager Su Blake, talking to This is Gloucestershire.

 “All the boat owners on the marina have been having lots of problems. My office is probably 100 yards or so away and I had to keep the door shut that I’d normally leave open for air.

Compost production company New Earth Solutions has recently spent £250,000 on improvements to the factory after local residents made complaints to the Environment Agency.

But marina co-owner Brian Williams said there was still “an unacceptable level of smell coming from the factory, which again has caused the fly population to increase to
intolerable levels.”

EA spokeswoman Jess Campbell confirmed that new complaints had been received but said that they came after months of satisfactory operation by the factory.

“We have increased the number of odour monitoring visits we make to the site and we are continuing to monitor the situation,” she said.

Picture by Nickserabi