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Two men have been taken into custody as an element of an investigation into the tipping of many thousands of metric tons of refuse in a open field in the county of Oxfordshire.

Officials stated that a 69-year-old was detained at a property in the town of Andover, while a 54-year-old was detained in the town of Slough in connection with the huge heap of waste dumped near Kidlington, Oxfordshire.

These arrests come after a prior report which uncovered the presence of over 500 unlawful tips in England, including at minimum 11 so-called "large-scale sites" greater than 20,000 metric tons.

A representative for the regulatory body commented that the apprehensions were for environmental and money laundering crimes and constituted a "vital step" in ongoing investigations. The apprehended men have been set free on conditional release.

Scale of the Problem

The tipping ground in the Kidlington area, located between the Cherwell River and the A34 road, is estimated to house about 21,000 tonnes of refuse in a mound which is up to 150m (490ft) long and 6m (20ft) high.

This heap of rubbish is made up of what appears to be treated domestic refuse, fragmented plastics, expanded polystyrene, tyres and assorted household articles.

It constitutes just a single of 517 unauthorized sites in England, at a minimum of 11 of which are estimated to hold in excess of 20,000 metric tons of rubbish. They encompass a 280,000-tonne area in the county of Cheshire, two 50,000-tonne locations in Lancashire and Cornwall and a 36,000-tonne dump in the county of Kent.

The actual figure of such larger locations is expected to be higher, as the regulatory authority has in the past stated it does not possess information on tonnage for all illegal site.

The majority sites are in agricultural settings, frequently concealed, and on land that should be arable land.

Criminal Enterprise

Authorities state many are managed by criminal organizations, who are generating cash by asking for much less than lawful operators to receive and landfill rubbish.

Businesses have to pay gate fees to use lawful disposal sites, based on the quantity and nature of material they are trying to dispose of, and a waste tax is also levied at just over £126 per tonne.

Public Outrage

Preparation efforts to remove the affected dump started recently due to fears over the potential of fire and the effect that would have on the nearby highway.

A commercial waste removal contractor has been granted the job to remediate the area over the coming 12 months at a cost of £9.6m.

An compliance manager for the national regulatory team stated that the agency would be looking to recover the clean-up costs under asset recovery legislation from any individual successfully found guilty at the conclusion of its ongoing case.

She noted that the recent arrests would help "push the inquiry forward" and allow officials to "follow more leads to determine precisely what occurred and who was involved".

"The illegal site at this location was an atrocious and calculated attack on our ecology and we understand the community's outrage at this horrific offence," she said.

A cabinet official welcomed the arrests, commenting: "The unlawful deposit of rubbish at the site is appalling and has caused considerable damage to the natural world and anguish to the local residents.

"The government is pledged to eradicating this category of illegal activity throughout the country, by augmenting resources to tackle waste crime, recruiting more officers and enacting stricter controls and fines for those who violate the regulations."

The detentions were made on Thursday by officers from a regional serious crime squad and are in addition to an previous apprehension of a man in his thirties from the Guildford region in last November. He was set free awaiting more enquiries.