EM Earthmovers fined for allowing demolition material to be dumped at Highbury quarry

A QUARRY owner has been fined for operating an illegal waste depot in the northeastern foothills.

A QUARRY owner has been fined for operating an illegal waste depot in the northeastern foothills.

The Environmental Protection Authority prosecuted EM Earthmovers Pty Ltd for allowing more than 100 tonnes of demolition material — including asbestos — to be dumped at Highbury.

EPA investigators watched trucks owned by a demolition company, Port Adelaide Salvage, deliver 25 loads to the quarry on Churchett Rd between August and September, 2012. Inquiries determined EM Earthmovers — owned by Elliott Peter Musolino and Pauline Elizabeth Musolino — had been letting Port Adelaide Salvage dump demolition waste at the quarry for three years.

Mr Musolino admitted he’d cut a deal with the company’s owner, Maurizio Corsaro, not to charge him if he sold building aggregate produced at the quarry.

Corsaro’s company began trucking demolition waste to the quarry in October 2009.

The activity was discovered in 2012 when EPA investigators followed a truck from a demolition site to the quarry. The site was then put under covert surveillance.

Musolino and Corsaro were questioned in November 2012, with an order being issued for the dumping of the demolition waste to cease.

Further investigations found the waste contained rubbish, wood, brick, plastic, carpet, tiles, plant material, heavy metals, pesticides and asbestos. The material since has been capped.

Environment Resources and Development Court Senior Judge Susanne Cole fined EM Earthmovers — which pleaded guilty to environmental offences — $24,200, plus $1400 in prosecution costs.