ELDERLY residents have been left coughing and spluttering because of smoke emanating from charcoal production near their homes.

Dorset Charcoal, which set up kilns on land owned by Dorset Wildlife Trust at Tarrant Keyneston, agreed to scale down production following a number of complaints and an investigation by Environmental Health.

The problems centred around the Ashley Wood mobile home park and started around a fortnight ago.

Resident Brian Prosser, 57, said: "There has been a lot of smoke coming into the park - much of it actually got into our homes. Some of the elderly residents were coughing and choking. It was terrible.

"My smoke alarms went off and I called the fire brigade to ask them to investigate. The good weather and high temperatures seemed to trap the smoke pollution and make it more unbearable. Breathing was very difficult and many of the residents were concerned about the situation."

North Dorset District Council's Environmental Health department confirmed complaints had been received and a site visit by their officers found evidence of the problem.

A spokesperson for the council said: "Following our involvement, they scaled down the operation, and agreed to cease the operation earlier than planned.

"This was deemed to be an appropriate compromise between the need to deal with the recurring smoke problems and the legitimate business activity, which has avoided the council potentially becoming embroiled in lengthy and expensive legal wrangles.

"We will be liaising with the woodland owners in order to avoid a repeat of this problem in the future."

Jim Bettle of Dorset Charcoal has issued a public apology for the nuisance: "I certainly don't want to upset people."

But he said with the bank holiday weekend looming, the demand for barbecue charcoal was high and he would lose contracts with suppliers if he failed to meet that demand.

He added: "We've worked on numerous sites in Dorset and have never had a problem with smoke. We look at the proximity of housing and prevailing wind and make a judgement call.

"It's a sustainable practice and more environmentally friendly to convert the timber to charcoal on site than shipping it elsewhere."

He added: "Production of charcoal here has now finished."

First published: August 25, 2005