But NJP has reassured residents on an adjacent housing development that the plant will not have the damaging environmental effects they fear.

Managing director Bob Pitts said: "I can understand that residents who have recently bought a house in the estate want to know what their new neighbour will look like."

He said the factory's distribution and waste plant would face away from nearby housing onto the A11, and that a mound would be built to shield the housing estate from the plant.

More than 20 residents have written letters to the town clerk protesting at the plans. One protestor told the local press that the plant would change Wymondham "from a support town for a rural area to a dumping ground in south Norfolk".