ABSTRACT
At 3 pm on Monday 17 September 1984 ReChem presented what was, to many of its detractors, an unconditional surrender. After a IO-year war with the community around Bonnybridge and Denny in central Scotland, local politicians and national environmentalists, ReChem had decided to close its incineration process at Roughmute, Larbert in Stirlingshire. The reasons, the company emphasized, were entirely financial and unconnected with "allegations of environmental impact on the locality".! This wasn't lost on the community who believed the real war had yet to begin. "On the Monday we heard the news that ReChem was going to close," recalled John Wheeler of the Society for the Control of Troublesome and Toxic Industrial Emissions (SCOTTIE), the Stirlingshire community group. "All through the summer it was really like the build-up to the First World War."2
