Landfill Check

Historic landfill sites in Wolsingham, County Durham

The Environment Agency records 7 historic landfill sites in and around Wolsingham, County Durham. covering roughly 16 hectares in total. The largest is Knitsley Fell at 5.31 ha. Recorded waste ranges up to industrial waste. Data: October 2025 revision.

Recorded landfill boundaries around Wolsingham (indicative, digitised at 1:10,000).

All recorded sites, largest first

SiteAreaLast inputWaste types
Knitsley Fell5.31 ha1981Industrial
West of Wolsingham3.79 ha1982IndustrialInert
Redmires Farm Quarry2.84 ha1992Industrial
East Sandy Carr2.07 ha1987IndustrialInert
OS Field 1481.85 haIndustrialInert
Railway 1km East of Frosterley0.2 haWaste types not recorded
The Moss0.09 ha1986Inert

What this data does — and doesn't — cover

  • Licensed-era records only. Waste licensing began in 1974. Older tips — especially small pre-war ones — are incompletely recorded, so absence from this data does not mean no landfill ever existed here.
  • Not the contaminated-land register. Councils hold a separate register of land determined as contaminated. A historic landfill entry is not a contamination determination, and vice versa.
  • Boundaries are indicative. Digitised at 1:10,000 scale; some are buffers around a point rather than surveyed edges.
  • Not a substitute for a formal environmental search. If you're buying, your conveyancer's environmental search checks this and several other sources.

EA Historic Landfill dataset, October 2025 revision. More on the methodology page.

Common questions

How many former landfill sites are there in Wolsingham?
7 historic (closed) landfill sites are recorded within about 15km of Wolsingham town centre in the Environment Agency's Historic Landfill dataset (October 2025 revision). Pre-1974 sites are incompletely recorded, so the true historical number is likely higher.
How do I check a specific address in Wolsingham?
Search the postcode on Landfill Check — you'll see every recorded site within 1km, with distance, direction and waste types, measured to the site boundary.

Nearby areas

Worth reading: buying a house near a former landfill and what the waste types mean.