Fontburn Reservoir
Liquid / sludgeIndustrialHouseholdCommercial
Fontburn Reservoir is a historic (closed) landfill site recorded by the Environment Agency near Rothbury, Northumberland. It received liquid/sludge, industrial, household and commercial waste between 1976 and 2005, covering about 1.82 hectares. Reference EAHLD06757, October 2025 data revision.
Full record
| EA reference | EAHLD06757 |
|---|---|
| Site name | Fontburn Reservoir |
| Address | Ewesley, Morpeth, Northumberland |
| Site operator | Not recorded |
| Licence holder | Northumbrian Water Limited |
| Licence issued | 15 March 1994 |
| Licence surrendered | 30 September 2005 |
| First waste input | 31 December 1976 |
| Last waste input | Not recorded |
| Area | 1.82 ha |
| Gas control | Yes |
| Leachate containment | Not recorded |
| Licensed site | Yes |
| EA area | Northumbria NE |
| Grid reference | 404500, 593900 |
Source: Environment Agency Historic Landfill Sites dataset, October 2025 revision.
Boundary map
What these waste types mean
- Liquid / sludge:
- liquid wastes and sludges, such as sewage sludge or industrial effluent. Can be mobile in groundwater, so worth understanding.
- Industrial:
- factory and process waste. Contents vary widely — some benign, some not; the site's operator and era are the clues.
- Household:
- everyday domestic refuse. Decomposes and can generate landfill gas for a few decades after closure.
- Commercial:
- waste from shops and offices — paper, packaging, food. Similar profile to household waste, usually less of it.
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.