Friends of Gedling Country Park



|Nottinghamshire County Council |Name |

|Development Management Planning Services |House no and road town |

|County Hall |Nottingham |

|Loughborough Road |post code |

|West Bridgford | |

|Nottingham | |

|NG7 2AQ | |

Date

REF Planning application ES/3140

Tamar Energy – Anaerobic Digestion Plant

Dear Mr Hankin

Objections to Tamar Energy Anaerobic Digester plans.

I/we wish to object to the application for planning permission by Tamar Energy for an Anaerobic Digester Plant based upon public need, zoning, environmental and traffic grounds.

I/we question that there is a specific need for this AD facility in this area and particularly at this location given that there are already two AD plants within 3 miles; Severn Trent at Stoke Bardolph and Bio Dynamic (UK) Ltd at Colwick Industrial Estate. These can more than adequately cope with local demand today and have sufficient capacity to expand for the future. In addition, Tamar Energy actually already has a plant in Nottinghamshire located at Retford.

With regards to the proposed location for application ES/3140, I/we ask that you consider the immediate proximity of the brand new Gedling Country Park that has just been created at a cost in excess of £1million. The park will surround the proposed AD facility on three sides and is located just 5 metres away.

A new picnic area has been created which would be just 20 metres away – along with a newly enhanced lagoon attracting wildlife and fauna.

On the fourth side of the proposed AD facility location there will, over the next 5 years, be a development of some 900 new houses, a children’s playground, a primary school and a medical centre – all located within 200-300 metres.

Tamar Energy’s application indicates that the location is disused and a former heavy industrial colliery site – and fails to mention the extent of the development of the country park that has now occurred and its proximity – and fails to mention at all the proposed proximity of the aforementioned school and playground etc.

In fact this location has already been zoned for development of housing and light industrial use and therefore we believe it would be an incorrect allocation of this land if the proposed AD facility is approved.

Traffic objections

Local roads (Arnold Lane, Shearing Hill & Main Rd) are already overloaded with cars and HGVs carrying in excess of 17,000 vehicles per day. They cannot take the additional HGV traffic that this plant will bring with around 81 lorry’s loads a day. The increased traffic would be environmentally damaging to both the Country Park and Gedling Village highways and hazardous for both pedestrians and other road users.

Tamar’s report suggests a steady flow of vehicle throughout the working day; this will not be the situation. The flow of transport will peak and trough throughout the day it will be very heavy early in the morning from when the plant opens then again in the afternoon. This because vehicles will load the night before to be at site as early as possible so they can go back to collect a second load to deliver in the afternoon in between you will have the smaller bin wagons delivering at random times.

Discussions held locally with other plant operators tell us to expect multiple HGVs to queuing at a time to be tipped – especially early in the morning.

Odour, Air Quality & Air Pollution

The location of the proposed plant has three boundaries with the Country Park and beyond the other boundary is the current residential area of Gedling. This will mean that users of the Country Park and local residents would be subjected to odour generated from the plant itself and from the HGVs coming and going from the site on a daily basis.

Tamar Energy would plan to use negative pressure and fast closing door. However, their plans show the reception shed having four doors for vehicles to tip and when there is a backlog of vehicles those four doors will be continually being opened releasing odour.

Another cause of odour will happen when the plant has a breakdown which will happen from time to time as motors fail and pumps fail. There will be situations where the reception shed will be storing waste until repairs are completed and this will cause odour. As the plant gets older and parts get worn this will become an increasing issue.

Noise

This industrial facility will operate twenty four hours a day, seven days a week. The delivery, loading and movement of food waste will be noisy. HGVs could stand idle and the engines and electricity generator will also be noisy and impact negatively on the environment.

Local operators of similar facilities have described the impact of day to day operations of the plant as “incredibly noisy”. Significant noise levels will be created during the operation of the plant (especially processing of waste tinned products), movement of vehicles on and off the site and the unloading of vehicles.

A significant increase in noise levels is not suitable on the footstep of a Country Park, nor near to residential areas.

Vermin

There is a known hazard of vermin infestation with similar AD plants and this will not be contained within a boundary fence and will cause a hazard for park visitors particularly dog walkers and be disturbing for families with young children.

Anyone having a picnic on the country park will be inundated with them, flies breed from May to September exactly the same time the park will be at its highest visitor rate

An increase in vermin numbers on site would also pose a wider public health problem to visitors of the Country Park through an increased risk in exposure to Leptospirosis. Leptospirosis also known as Weils Disease is a type of bacterial infection spread by animals in particular rats.

In 90% of cases, leptospirosis only causes mild flu-like symptoms, such as headache, chills and muscle pain. However, in some cases the infection is more severe and can cause life-threatening problems, including organ failure and internal bleeding.

You can catch leptospirosis by touching soil or water contaminated with the urine of wild animals infected with the leptospira bacteria.

Impact upon the Country Park

When the biogas is created in the Anaerobic Digester two gases are created (Nitrogen Dioxide & Sulphur Dioxide). The exhaust fumes are likely to include around 20% Carbon Dioxide. Release of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere will create localised acid rain.

Acid rain deposited over the soil within the Country Park, will over time change the soil structure and ultimately the vegetation structure.

A change in the vegetation structure is extremely likely to have an effect upon the local flora and fauna within the Park.

Additionally if the height of the proposed exhaust stack is made taller the distribution area of said gases becomes greater.

The size of the digester tanks in particular will be too large for the proposed location and will seriously undermine the quality and experience of visitors to the country park. Due to the immediate proximity to the park and that they will be sited on lower ground, they will be visually obtrusive across multiple views.

The picture below illustrates this – showing views from and of the country park and of the current small methane plant. Consider when looking at this, that the proposed AD facility will be six times larger and located just to the right – driving a wedge into the heart of the country park:

[pic]

Safety

Please see the following news article of a safety incident at another plant:



Were this to happen here, it would be a major concern right on the door step of a country park and the Ouse Dyke if this was to happen not only would the county park be contaminated but so would the Ouse Dyke that runs to the river Trent.

Zoning and Employment

I/we believe that the allocation of this land for use as a Digester Plant is contrary to the zoning plans and strategy set out in the Council’s Core Aligned Strategy.

Tamar Energy’s application indicates that the location is disused and a former heavy industrial colliery site – and fails to mention the extent of the development of the Country Park that has now occurred and its proximity. This location has already been zoned for development of housing and light industrial use and therefore we believe it would be an incorrect allocation of this land if the proposed AD facility is approved.

A better use of this land would be for light industrial and office allocation, perhaps including the development of a hi-tech business park here. This would not only generate significantly more employment than the proposed 5 staff suggested by Tamar Energy for their plant – but would help to revitalise the economy in this particular area – and attract beneficial and meaningful inward investment.

Conclusion

To recap, I/ we do not support the plans for an AD facility at this particular location based upon the detrimental impacts to local residents (current and future), environmental impacts within the park and the risk to public health from siting such a facility in such close proximity to residential and public amenity areas including the brand new Country Park which has just been created at a cost in excess of £1 million.

There is adequate capacity within 3 miles of the proposed site to deal with waste at an appropriately situated alternative facility.

Yours sincerely,

Name

Address

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