Controversial plans for a biomass power plant in Bishop’s Castle have been withdrawn by the developers.
The scheme has caused controversy since it was submitted to South Shropshire District Council in June.
Developers Bishop’s Castle Biomass Power confirmed they had withdrawn the plans but said they would be re-submitted as soon as possible in the new year.
John Evans, a director of Biomass Power, said: “We have listened to what people had to say and they wanted more time to consult so we are giving them the chance to do that.
“There is also more information we want to put together.”
Concerned residents started up the Bishop’s Castle Group to look into the plans and recently decided to oppose them.
The main reasons for the opposition included health fears over the wood chips that will be burned and the location of the plant.
The group also claimed that not enough information had been provided by the developers and people had not been given enough time to consult.
Last week 200 people turned out to a public meeting in the town to hear representations on the plans from group members.
They were urged to make their feelings known to the council before the consultation period ended in December.
Michael Dawes, a member of the Bishop’s Castle Group, said, “We see this as a tactical withdrawal by the developers and the plan for the power plant has not gone away.
“We believe the developers want time to get their act together.”
Mr Dawes said he had paid a visit to the SSDC planning office and read a five-page report by the Environment Agency detailing concerns about the plans.
He said: “It is clear that the agency feels that not enough information has been provided by the developers - something we have been saying ourselves for many months.”
By Catherine Roche
7 Comments
It should be withdrawn completely. Regardless of the technology it’s simply the wrong site.
I’ll be the first to admit that I know very little of the plans in question, and am willing to be flamed as a result.
Yet.
We live in a society that is constantly badgered over climate change. We must do something to reduce our carbon footprint; we must re-cycle more; we must reduce our dependency on fossil fuels etc etc etc.
And here we have a scheme that proposes to produce power through sustainable and re-cyclable materials, which has been opposed!
I thought power generation without the use of gas / oil / coal was a good thing.
Confused.
Yes. Build them a nice Nuclear Power Plant, instead!
They can set up a group called: “Nuclear Power for Bishop’s Castle.”
The proposal has been withdrawn because it would have been reccommended for refusal at the Jan planning committee meeting.
The reasons for refusal could be summerised as inadequate information, and lack of community support.
There is no dispute with the need to reduce CO2 emmsiions but this scheme is the wrong one, it is only 15% efficient, there is little prospect of waste heat utilisation, there is already a report funded by £100,000 of your money that says that biomass production is not viable in this area and the technology is not identified.
By withdrawing the application now the developers can reapply without paying a further fee for one year.
This has nothing to do with seeking community support, this withdrawal is designed to save the fee which would inevitably be lost on Jan 9th when the scheme was due to be turfed out in spades.
How many from the Bishops Castle Group went to Tenbury Wells on 28 November 2007 to hear Dr Dick van Steenis speak about the health hazards of emissions from burning wood?
Bishops Castle needs to get their baseline health examined first, otherwise how will they know if it’s got any worse?
True its an inefficient plant, like all our coal fired stations, and that just isn’t good enough these days when we need everything to be highly efficient. A heat only woodchip plant to replace all the oil boilers in the college, industrial estate etc would be more like it.
M Dawes - What is the £100k report you referred to? Who did it, where can i see it? etc
Many thanks
I don’t think there is a sane person in either Bishops Castle or Tenbury Wells who would deny the need for EFFICIENT electricity generation from sustainable sources. The answer, as Mr A Hek intimates above, is of course smaller local generators to power public buildings, schools, factories etc etc. We are a few years away from having fuel generated from a soup of cloned ‘bio-DNA’, which all the big oil companies are working on, so wood/miscanthus etc is best option at present, if burned efficiently to produce direct heat.