RMC, the readymix concrete group, have donated £30,000 from their Environment Fund to help pay for the Totternhoe Clunch limestone restoration of the Lady Chapel windows at St Albans Cathedral.

Before Christmas, representatives of the Fund were joined by people from Groundwork Hertfordshire and St Albans Cathedral Trust on a tour of the cathedral followed by a visit to Totternhoe Lime & Stone Company to see the quarry from which the stone for the restoration is being extracted.

Totternhoe Clunch was used for part of the original 14th century construction of St Albans Cathedral as well as other historical buildings in the area (for example Woburn Abbey, Ashridge House and several churches).

Now Totternhoe Quarry is once again providing stone to the cathedral. This time it is being used for the on-going restoration of the Lady Chapel windows, suffering from advanced corrosion and decay.

The work is being funded by RMC through the Landfill Tax Credit Scheme, which allows landfill tax to be diverted to local projects.

After visiting the quarry, the Dean of St Albans, the Very Rev Christopher Lewis, thanked Roger Bates, managing director of the Lime & Stone Company, for his hospitality, although the stone produced for restoration work is dealt with by the family business of H G Clarke & Son.

The Dean said: "Despite its massive size, St Albans Cathedral is quite fragile, especially when it comes to its stonework. We are, however, making progress and the RMC Environment Fund has been a great ally in the restoration programme. I am enormously grateful."

Lord Cranborne, chairman of the St Albans Cathedral Trust, said: "St Albans Cathedral is rooted in Hertfordshire and Bedfordshire. It is a spiritual centre for the Diocese and its construction has from the very beginning reflected that fact. It is entirely right that the diocese as a whole should continue to play a full part in helping restore the cathedral and that Totternhoe Quarry should once again be used in that work.

Totternhoe Quarry is an ancient site that seems to have been worked since the 2nd century BC. Extraction of the stone continued during the Roman occupation and later the quarry was operated by the monks of Dunstable Priory.

The quarry includes a labyrinth of caves and tunnels, many decorated with carvings. It is reported to have an underground chapel, although that has yet to be rediscovered.

More recently the quarry was used for the processing of lime only. It was only in 1992 when the Duke of Bedford wanted Clunch for the restoration of Woburn Abbey that blocks were produced again.