Gloucestershire CC ordered to pay £180k after losing quarry appeal

The costs to Councils – and taxpayers – of defending themselves against mineral companies appealing against local democratic decisions became apparent this week. 

In 2023, Gloucestershire County Council refused an application 23/0001/REFUSE by Moreton C Cullimore to extract 1.5 million tonnes of sand and gravel at Bow Farm near Tewkesbury, contrary to planning officer advice. According to Gloucestershirelive: 

...the proposals which also included a concrete batching plant, the creation of clean water ponds, silt ponds and stock piles at the 160-acre site were met with strong opposition from hundreds of residents. A total of 257 people objected, raising concerns over noise, the health and environmental impact of dust generated at the site and the impact it would have on nearby businesses such as Hilton Puckrup Hall Hotel. Some 72 people wrote in support. 

The company appealed. A one-day hearing took place in December. The main issues were: 

• the effect of the proposal on the local economy with regard to dust and noise; and 

• whether the proposal is contrary to the Council’s declared climate emergency and the national planning policy objectives for transitioning to a low carbon future.

In January this year, the inspector allowed the appeal and also ruled that the Council must pay the company's costs. The inspector explained:

The PPG makes it clear that a local planning authority is at risk of an award of costs if it fails to produce evidence to substantiate each reason for refusal on appeal and/or makes vague, generalised or inaccurate assertions about a proposal’s impact which are unsupported by any objective analysis. Other examples of unreasonable behaviour include preventing or delaying development which should clearly be permitted having regard to its accordance with the development plan, national policy and any other material considerations, and refusing planning permission on a planning ground capable of being dealt with by conditions, where it is concluded that suitable conditions would enable the proposed development to go ahead.

And concluded: 

In the planning judgement, it appears to me that having regard to the provisions of the development plan, national planning policy and other relevant considerations, the proposed development should not have reasonably been refused. The refusal of permission therefore constitutes unreasonable behaviour contrary to the guidance in the PPG and the applicant has been faced with the unnecessary expense of addressing these matters.

This week, at a Planning Committee meeting, it was announced that the Council is to pay £180,349 to cover Cullimore's appeal costs. Punchline-Gloucester reported:

Council officers revealed yesterday there was no budget for a loss of this kind and the payment would result in an overspend in the budget.

But councillors on the planning committee said they had "no regrets" and would make the same decision again to try and protect residents and the planet...

Cllr Bernard Fisher (LD, St Paul's and Swindon) said: "It was a majority decision of the committee and that is our prerogative. "If you want to do away with democracy you can have a rubber stamp to go along with all officers recommendations. Like us, they are human and they get it wrong. "People who can afford the most expensive lawyers often win. But not pursuing a case because you can't afford to pay the costs is not the way we should operate. "The people of that area will have to live with this decision. I have no regrets." 

Cllr Susan Williams (C, Bisley and Painswick) said: "I totally agree. I voted against it because I felt it was morally right for me to make that decision. "Without us standing up there won't be change in the future. It needs to start at county level. I stand by my decision."

The £180k the Council must pay is obviously in addition to its own costs for defending the appeal.

  

For comparison, the appeal mounted by Aggregate Industries in 2022 against Devon County Council's decision to refuse planning permission for a quarry at Straitgate Farm resulted in an 8-day public inquiry. The Council defended each of the seven reasons given for refusing permission. At the inquiry, the main issues were: 

i) the effect of the development on water supplies and human health; 

ii) its effect on drainage and flood risk; 

iii) its effect on heritage assets; 

iv) its effect on trees and hedgerows; 

v) its effect on highway safety; and 

vi) its effect on biodiversity. 

vii) The sustainability of transporting sand and gravel by road from Straitgate Farm to Hillhead Quarry. 

No application for costs was made by Aggregate Industries. No costs were awarded by the Inspectors. 

The Council's reasons for refusing the company permission to quarry Straitgate Farm were – despite going against planning officer advice – wholly reasonable.

EDIT 12.4.24 "A hard-fought victory for the quarry everyman"

Quarry archeological investigations cost Forterra £500k

Signs of Roman buildings, and a settlement of Iron Age roundhouses from over 2000 years ago, were certainly not what Aggregate Industries wanted to find when archaeological surveys were carried out at Straitgate Farm in 2014. But what did it expect? The site's prominent hilltop position was an important junction, where a Roman road (the Fosse Way – the old A30) crossed a Saxon road (B3180) running from the Blackdown Hills to Exmouth. 

Strætgeat 1061: 

v. stræt , geat . The farm lies by the Roman road to Exeter. For the geat , v. supra 603 n.

Results from the trench evaluation at Straitgate revealed that: 

Including the Long Range site and Areas 2 and 6 at Straitgate it is apparent that this Iron Age open settlement extends over an area of potentially c. 10 hectares... based on the geophysics and trench results, around 12-15 further roundhouses in total might be anticipated... Three pieces of Romano-British period tile from overlying deposits and two holed slates from the large ditch in Trenches 22 and 56 may indicate a ‘Romanised’ building is present in the vicinity... new evidence for Romano-British settlement was identified, dated from the artefacts recovered to the 2nd to 3rd centuries AD, including a substantial linear ditch of 30m length, c. 5m width and over 2.2m depth. 

Based on these finds, Aggregate Industries put forward a proposed archaeological mitigation map.     

Condition 23 of the Planning Inspectorate's permission to quarry Straitgate Farm says: 

No development shall take place until a written Archaeological Scheme of Investigation has been submitted to and approved in writing by the Mineral Planning Authority and implementation of a programme of archaeological work has been secured. The development shall be carried out at all times in accordance with the approved scheme. 

One company that knows a thing or two about Archaeological Schemes of Investigation is brick-producer Forterra, or Hanson Building Products as it was previously known. Last week, it announced that archeological investigations of a 3,000 year old Bronze Age settlement at Must Farm, a quarry close to its Kings Dyke brickworks in Whittlesey, Peterborough, had set it back in excess of £500k. 

The quarry provides Oxford Clay, used in the production of London Bricks. The material has been quarried in the area for more than 140 years. 

The Must Farm project, described as "Britain’s Pompeii":   

was a 10-month excavation of a settlement at the site that was destroyed by fire, causing it to collapse into a river channel, preserving the contents in situ.

In 1999: 

decaying timbers were discovered protruding from the southern face of the quarry pit at Must Farm. Subsequent investigations in 2004 and 2006 dated the timbers to the Bronze Age and identified them as a succession of large structures spanning an ancient watercourse.

During the excavation in 2015-16 by the Cambridge Archaeological Unit (CAU) of four large wooden roundhouses and a square entranceway structure: 

archaeologists retrieved almost 200 wooden artefacts, more than 150 fibre and textile items, 128 pottery vessels and more than 90 pieces of metalwork. More than 18,000 pieces of structural wood were recorded.

Two open-access publications, published and funded by Cambridge’s McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research, have now been launched detailing the finds, and next month some of the preserved objects will go on display at Peterborough Museum.

The Department of Archeology at the University of Cambridge wrote: 

Detailed monographs on thousands of artefacts pulled from the settlement at Must Farm reveals the surprisingly sophisticated domestic lives of Bronze Age Fen people, from home interiors to recipes, clothing, kitchenware and pets 

This week, Forterra, having shared the £1.1m cost of the excavation, claimed to be "delighted to have been involved in the uncovering and documenting of Must Farm". 

Forterra may claim to be delighted now, but excavation of the site might never have happened had the company had its way. In 2014, Hanson had pushed to leave the archeology in situ. However, Cambridgeshire County Council, on advice from English Heritage and the University of Cambridge, Division of Archaeology, said in a Planning Committee report: 

9.1 It is recommended that the applicants be advised that the proposed revised rewetting scheme submitted in May 2013 is considered to be contrary to the provisions of Policy CS36 in that the revised scheme of preservation in situ is not considered suitable or appropriate in the circumstances and refused. 

 9.2 It is further recommended that Hanson be advised that they should, within the next three months submit a further revised scheme of archaeological mitigation being a focused strategy to retrieve and record the vulnerable remains of the Late Bronze Age Timber Platform Site at the edge of Old Must Pit, in order to safeguard the remains from further damage or decay. 

Fortunately for Hanson, the company was successful with a subsequent application to English Heritage (now Historic England) to cover half the excavation costs. 

The rest, as they say, is history.

EA starts final 6-week public consultation on Hemerdon processing plant

The previous operator of the Hemerdon tin and tungsten mine near Plympton caused low frequency noise disturbance and sleep deprivation to local people, before falling into insolvency in 2018. 

Tungsten West, the current operator, has taken strides to fix the previous noise issues and this week announced that the Environment Agency, which is now "minded to grant" an environmental permit for the previously offending Mineral Processing Facility, has commenced a final six week public consultation. Neil Gawthorpe, CEO of the company, commented:  

The receipt and acceptance of the draft permit for the MPF has been a positive milestone for the Company. It represents a significant step in securing the further funding required for the Project, and delivering our key objective of recommencing operations at the Hemerdon mine and providing an ethical and sustainable domestic supply of critical minerals.

The Environment Agency has a web page and video explaining the consultation process and the changes Tungsten West has made to the plant: 

We are seeking your comments on the proposed decision for a new bespoke application for an environmental permit from Drakelands Restoration Limited for Hemerdon Mine Tungsten West Ltd Plympton PL7 5BW

We can take account of

* Relevant environmental regulatory requirements and technical standards. 

* Information on local population and sensitive sites. 

* Comments on whether the right process is being used for the activity, for example whether the technology is the right one. 

* The shape and use of the land around the site in terms of its potential impact, whether that impact is acceptable and what pollution control or abatement may be required. 

* The impact of noise and odour from traffic on site. 

* Permit conditions by providing information that we have not been made aware of in the application, or by correcting incorrect information in the application (e.g. monitoring and techniques to control pollution). 

EDIT 28.3.24 Tungsten West funding update

Run-off problems at Venn Ottery. Would AI’s legacy at Straitgate be the same?

Aggregate Industries' surface water management plan for Straitgate Farm has yet to be approved. In 2016, we posted: 

Watercourses originating from Straitgate pass through four communities downstream; communities that are prone to flooding. Any quarrying at Straitgate Farm must not make the situation worse, either during work or afterwards. DCC has requested that any plans make the situation better. How this could be so, with the loss of millions of gallons of groundwater storage capacity in the unsaturated layer of sand and gravel on top of the hill above these communities, remains to be seen.

Pre-Commencement Condition 6 states: 

No development hereby permitted shall commence until a Construction and Environmental Management Plan... has been submitted to and approved in writing by the Mineral Planning Authority. The Plan shall include... (d) details of the management of surface water during the construction and soil stripping phases 

The plan is still up in the air because the company has yet to produce any reliable infiltration rates. Condition 13 states:

(b) Updated infiltration tests shall be carried out using an infiltrometer and shall be undertaken in strict accordance with BRE Digest 365 Soakaway Design (2016) and must be undertaken within the Budleigh Salterton Pebble Beds. A representative number of tests shall be conducted in order to provide adequate coverage of the site, with particular focus placed on the locations and depths of potential infiltration devices; 

The results of these tests will inform the size of attenuation ponds required to stop downslope flooding, remembering Condition 25 which states:

No water body shall be created within the site other than the approved weigh bridge lagoon.  

Why is it important to get these infiltration tests right? Look at the problems at Venn Ottery, with fingers being pointed towards Aggregate Industries' worked-out sand and gravel quarry, uphill and nearby. 

More than a million tonnes of material were removed between 2011 and 2016, material that would have previously acted as a 'sponge' for rainfall above a downstream community. 

We’ve posted about surface water run-off problems from this site before. 

Back in 2015, Devon County Council admitted in correspondence that flooding in Venn Ottery was "to do with the quarrying activities". Newton Poppleford and Harpford Parish Council minutes also reported: 

Cllr Cole reported that the Quarry Manager was taking further remedial action to create a better settlement ponding system and other works to alleviate the problem of the Neighboring fields being washed out. A new pipe was to be placed under Green Lane where it had washed out. 

In 2016, Devon County Council's monitoring report for the quarry reported: 

Significant amount of run off was present in the waterbodies at the time of the visit.

In the same year, local people – in response to the company's planning application to restore the quarry to a higher level than was previously approved following "an error with the previous estimated amount" – reported "ongoing issues with surface water run-off from the quarry". The Council responded, saying: 

6.22 It is accepted that there have been a few occasions when surface water has discharged from the site, but in these instances the operator has acted quickly to remedy the situation and it is considered that the final restoration of the site (which includes water storage features) will adequately deal with any surface water issues.

Clearly, it hasn't, and the problem has become worse.

 

Last year, Venn Ottery "experienced its worst flooding event", according to the Venn Ottery & Southerton Residents Association. A Devon County Council report says nine properties were flooded internally. VOSRA claims: 

The increased run-off from the (now closed) Venn Ottery Quarry brought a river of water along the track from the Otterdene area to Venn Ottery green, where it crossed along 2 routes to join the stream that runs alongside the green and through the back gardens of 1-5 Barton Mews.

VOSRA compiled an extensive dossier of previous flooding events – including the map below – which was sent to East Devon District Council, Devon County Council, the Environment Agency, and the local MP. The dossier claims: 

From about 2012 onwards residents in the houses on west side of Venn Ottery green have noticed an increase in the volume of water running along the unmetalled road and across the green. Within a couple of years of starting quarrying in 2010, water from the quarry site caused the track that runs westeast from the Otterdene (Happy Valley) area towards Venn Ottery to become impassable, and the field nearby to (behind Dartwood, Brookdell) to be waterlogged. Similarly, ’Puddle Lane’ became even more muddy. When requested by the local community, Aggregate Industries provided quantities of pebbles to improve the drainage and raise the level of the track to some extent. 

The quarrying ceased and in 2017-18 the land was ‘restored’. An area on the northeast was formed into an attenuation lake to hold back excess water run-off. The lake is not very large so cannot always retain all the water, which then runs downhill and into VO. 

VOSRA is calling for action: 

The attenuation pond at the eastern corner of the closed quarry site is undersized and has no controls on overflow. Extension of the pond and the installation of a sluice to control the outflow could greatly reduce the speed at which water flows. 

How did this attenuation pond come to be so undersized, when such important details should have been scrutinised by Aggregate Industries’ expert consultants, as well as the relevant statutory bodies?

Could it be that infiltration rates in this material – the Budleigh Salterton Pebble Beds, the same material as at Straitgate – were assumed to be higher than in reality? At Straitgate, Aggregate Industries assumed inflated infiltration rates of 1m/d to size attenuation features, ignoring results of soakaway tests, which showed "Insufficient drop in water level".

The problems at Venn Ottery, however, don’t stop at downslope flooding. 

A bridleway was provided by Aggregate Industries on the eastern side of the site as a condition of the S106 agreement associated with processing the material at Blackhill, to "provide a safe alternative for part of the HGV route". 

Last month, part of the bridleway was washed away. Water running off the site has left a deep, unsafe canyon, and the bridleway has been closed.

Once upon a time, in answer to critics of the Venn Ottery plans, Aggregate Industries claimed:

We shall be putting back a lot more than we're taking away.

Locals, bailing water out from their houses, having their PROW swept away, might not be so sure.

Wettest 18 months on record – and still no groundwater monitoring at Straitgate

This week, the Environment Agency reported the wettest February in Devon and Cornwall, and the wettest 12 months in England, since records began in 1871. The FT went a step further, and reported that England has been drenched with the wettest 18 months since records began in 1836.  

The Planning Inspectors stipulated in their appeal decision that the estimated maximum water table at Straitgate Farm, the MWWT, the level the company is permitted to quarry down to, would be updated to reflect higher groundwater readings.

What is Aggregate Industries doing about this? Absolutely nothing at all. The company has not done any monitoring of groundwater levels at Straitgate for 2 years.

 

It's not the first time we've posted about this sorry situation. In December, we posted ‘Exceptionally high’ rainfall – and still no water monitoring at Straitgate, and last April, Wettest March since 1981 – and Straitgate groundwater levels not monitored.

Where would we be without geologists?

We have – from as early as 2013 – questioned the level of mineral resource at Straitgate Farm, given the ever increasing maximum water table, beneath which Aggregate Industries is not permitted to dig.

Aggregate Industries’ application to quarry Straitgate Farm was eventually permitted by the Planning Inspectorate on the basis of: 

Extraction of up to 1.5 million tonnes of as raised sand and gravel, restoration to agricultural land together with temporary change of use of a residential dwelling to a quarry office/welfare facility

Of course, there is not 1.5 million tonnes available – even Aggregate Industries admits that. 

Whilst in 2011, the company claimed that for Straitgate Farm "a saleable tonnage of 3,450,000 tonnes has been proven for the proposed phase one extraction area, and 3,795,000 tonnes has been proven for the proposed phase two extraction area", Aggregate Industries now claims there is only 1.06 million tonnes of saleable aggregate. 

This is less than the impossibly precise "saleable quantity of 1,659,780 tonnes of sand and gravel" Aggregate Industries claimed in 2015, less than the 1.2 million eventually revealed by the company for the Minerals Plan in 2016, even less than could be inferred from application documents in 2017. 

It is a figure that will be reduced again by any upward revisions to the MWWT, and by any of the "unmapped local faulting": 

At [nearby] Marshbroadmoor, the original planning application promised 1.1 million tonnes, but, due to 'geological faulting', no more than 200,000 tonnes ever came out.  

Minerals Surveyors Wardell Armstrong, in evidence to the Competition Commission’s Aggregates Markets Investigation, claimed: 

...no aggregates operator would consider (for example) trying to develop a sand and gravel deposit of less than one million tonnes. We have clients who have sites which have been turned down on this basis. The planning and development costs are considered too great on a per tonne basis. 

Aggregate Industries must be desperate. 

At least we can be thankful that the company's "calculations have been undertaken by Chartered Geologists". 

Or can we? The following joke springs to mind: 

There is a geologist, geophysicist, and a petroleum engineer in a room with their boss. The boss asks, "What’s 2 times 2?" The geologist thinks for a while says "well it’s probably more than 3 and less than 5". The geophysicist punches it into his calculator and answers that it’s 3.999999. The petroleum engineer gets up, locks the door, pulls the curtains, unplugs the phone and says, "What do you want it to be?" 

And even this, from that fountain of wisdom Calvin & Hobbes: 

Naturally, with or without a knowledge of math, Aggregate Industries’ business model of digging holes in the ground calls upon geologists, and last week the company put the call out for a new one: 

The selected candidate will be instrumental in exploring, evaluating, and advising on the geologic aspects crucial to our extraction and production processes. This is a great opportunity for the new postholder to make their stamp within a team which has recently been heavily invested with technology. 

Perhaps, heavily invested with technology, we can now expect more reliable estimations of mineral resources from Aggregate Industries. After all, the company’s last two quarries in East Devon produced significantly less than expected, and there’s every chance Straitgate, with all its issues, would too.

Hedgerows

🌳 💦Hedgerows planted on steep contours & high densities can reduce runoff rates up to 50%, preventing flooding &improving the water quality of our rivers & streams. This is by improving hydrological soil processes: increasing percolation, filtration & evapotranspiration 🌳 💦 pic.twitter.com/85J6DZIO9g

— Hedgelink (@Hedgelink_UK) March 4, 2024

Devon quarry hosts UK’s first driverless dump truck

The number of people employed by the quarrying industry has been in decline for many years, as we posted back in 2012, when we pointed to the fact that in 1968, 41 and 148 people worked at the nearby Blackhill and Rockbeare sites respectively, and wrote: 

Even over the last 10 years there has been a dramatic fall in employee numbers in sand and gravel, with the UK Minerals Yearbook reporting over 8000 employees in 2001, but under 3000 in 2010. The HSE says the "industry has difficulty attracting and recruiting staff" and "anecdotal evidence suggests an ageing workforce". 

Will the use of autonomous vehicles hasten that decline still further? 

This week, Sibelco’s china-clay Cornwood Quarry, near Ivybridge in Devon, hosted the UK launch of an autonomous articulated dump truck "designed to help futureproof the effectiveness and competitiveness of quarrying operations within the minerals and aggregates industry". 

The demonstration, from Chepstow Plant International and Bell Equipment, used technology from Xtonomy, a German company specialising in autonomous haulage systems: 

The development of autonomous driving capability opens the door to a range of operational efficiency, safety, environmental, and employee benefits to underpin the sector going forward.

Commenting on the Bell B40E dump truck, which also uses HVO instead of diesel, Ben Uphill, operations director for Kingsteignton Cluster at quarry-owner Sibelco, said: 

We envisage many benefits from having access to this sector-first autonomous ADT solution. The minerals and aggregates sector must embrace technology as a way of continually delivering improvements across our daily operations and cost base.

 

Battle to save pristine prehistoric rock art from vast new quarry in Norway

... reports The Observer:

Battle to save pristine prehistoric rock art from vast new quarry in Norway https://t.co/Q0iqpr8W5E

— The Observer (@ObserverUK) March 2, 2024

One of the largest and most significant sites of rock art in northern Europe is under “catastrophic” threat. 

The Vingen carvings, in Vestland county, Norway, are spectacular, and include images of human skeletons and abstract and geometric designs. Even the hammer stones, the tools used by the ancient artists to create their compositions, have survived. 

Now archaeologists warn that the site is facing a “catastrophic” threat after a quarry, a shipping port and a crushing plant in the area of nearby Frøysjøen received planning permission in February. 

George Nash, a British archaeologist and specialist in prehistoric art at Liverpool University, told the Observer that Vingen was an internationally important site featuring more than 2,000 carved figures. He is “shocked the Norwegian authorities want to stick a dirty great quarry nearby”... 

Nash said: “Does the economic project outweigh the cultural heritage and the environment? The answer’s no. Once you’ve screwed up that landscape, that’s it. It’s screwed... 

 

The rock art of #Vingen in #Norway and the surroundings should be protected in perpetuity for the benefit of all humanity. https://t.co/xwjFDhwVtD pic.twitter.com/VZBvtZ8aeG

— Bradshaw Foundation (@BradshawFND) February 29, 2024

Have you signed the petition to save the rock art of #Vingen in #Norway?? At risk of destruction due to a quarry. Please read about it and share widely! #SaveVingen https://t.co/8tHfec3ESp

— Dr Joana Valdez-Tullett (@JoanaValdez) February 13, 2024

Podcast digs into Brazil mining dam collapse – now UK’s largest class-action lawsuit

Dead River, a podcast by Liz Bonnin, tackles the fallout from the Mariana dam disaster in 2015 – the collapse of a tailings dam at an iron ore mine in Brazil owned by mining companies Vale and Anglo-Australian BHP Billiton, which killed 19 people in what was then considered the country’s worst environmental disaster. 

Little more than three years later, as we posted at the time, another tailings dam owned by Vale collapsed at Brumadinho killing 270 people.

 

A gripping tale of the worst environmental disaster in Brazil’s history & the heroes fighting for justice, as told by the victims & @PogustGoodhead⁩ who are taking BHP & Vale, the owners of the mining dam, to the English courts.
My new podcast #DeadRiver drops Monday 26th Feb pic.twitter.com/46iqgARs2S

— Liz Bonnin 💙 (@lizbonnin) February 21, 2024

The disaster you could see from space: how a podcast went inside an eco catastrophe https://t.co/6Wod0eYJ9d

— The Guardian (@guardian) March 1, 2024

While it is billed as a true crime podcast, Dead River encompasses everything from environmental destruction to colonial history, family tragedy to perilous chase scenes, indigenous anthropology to the sheer brutal fact of what a river carpeted with a million dead fish looks like. It tells the story of Brazil’s worst environmental disaster. According to this podcast, the collapse of the Fundão tailings dam in 2015, which stored the toxic byproducts of iron ore mining, created more immediate devastation even than the continuous felling of the Amazonian rainforest for cattle ranching. It also killed 19 people, made hundreds homeless, and was so vast that it could be seen from space. More than eight years later, those responsible have still not been fully held to account. This has led to the largest class-action lawsuit ever held in the UK, with more than 700,000 plaintiffs seeking justice from Anglo-Australian mining giant BHP through the English and Welsh courts. The company denies the claims against it. 

Liz Bonnin said: 

As a biologist and a conservationist who has learned over the years how deeply interconnected and interdependent all life on Earth is, I do wonder how we can be so nationalistic about it. To me, it’s so obvious that this matters to us. The natural world isn’t ours to exploit; it’s ours to protect so we can bloody well survive. For that reason alone we have a responsibility to understand and care about the damage we’re all causing as part of a system created by colonialism and capitalism. This isn’t a story about Brazil – it’s a story about all of us.

Aggregate Industries’ Straitgate update for February

Aggregate Industries provided the following update this week in relation to implementing its permission to quarry Straitgate Farm: 

Just to advise that we have been continuing to work on the schemes required by condition during February and hope soon to be in a position to start formally submitting these to the Council for approval, either towards the end of March or early April. 

We have also met with the Environment Agency to discuss the water monitoring scheme.