Acting against the recommendation of Planning officer EDDC`s Development Management committee, refused permission for the construction of “20 self-contained natural gas engine driven electricity generators”.

The scheme, proposed by applicant Plutus Energy, would have been built on land close to Woodbury Business Park, Woodbury.

The Key to the decision was Strategy 39 of the council’s local plan, which states the authority’s commitment to promoting the use of renewables and low carbon energy, as grounds for refusing the plans.

The planning report said that the proposed development “would be powered by natural gas and therefore it is important to recognise that this technology is a “facilitator of renewable energy” rather than a renewable technology or low carbon energy project itself and therefore there is little direct policy support within Strategy 39 for this proposal.”

However, it added that “whilst Strategy 39 of the local plan promotes renewable and low carbon energy, it does not in itself provide an “in principle” reason to refuse proposals for fossil fuel energy development.

Therefore, on balance, the Planning Officer considered that the adverse impacts from the scheme would “not significantly or demonstrably outweigh the benefits that would be derived from the scheme which would support the delivery of renewable and low carbon energy by providing back-up generation to help achieve the transition to a sustainable, low carbon future.”

However a team of local residents including an expert from commercial finance, a Professor who is recognised as a world expert of climate change, a solicitor, local councillors, planning experts spoke at the planning meeting with a very detailed forensic exposé of the proposed development that exposed that the far from “facilitating renewable energy it was would block any renewable energy being added to the National Grid, and rather than running at “only a few hours a day in winter time it would actually run over 3000 Hours a year, having a devastating effect on the area.

After a short debate, where the Legal Officer of the council recommended a referral because of the further information the committee voted against the proposal and the Legal Officers recommendation.

A statement from the council said the application had “proved controversial with the local community who raised a number of concerns regarding noise and pollution from the facility, as well as fears that a low carbon energy generation and storage facility was not being proposed, which would be consistent with addressing the climate change emergency declared by the council only a few weeks earlier.”