Public debate for Avonmouth power plant plan

Councillors, not unelected planning officials, will make the final decision over whether a power station which is fuelled by treated waste wood is built in Avonmouth, Bristol City Council (BCC) has said.

A planning application for the 11MW power plant at Chittening Industrial Estate had been put forward in the summer, during the height of local protests over air quality in the area.

The power plant would process 60,000 tonnes of waste wood a year to create a natural gas, which would then be burned to generate electricity.

Council officials had recommended that the decision over whether to approve the plans would be taken in private by officers, instead of passing the plans over to elected councillors to decide in public.

But a BCC spokesman has confirmed that councillors will now be given the chance to debate and decide on the scheme at a development control committee meeting on November 5.

“An application has been received for an 11MWe bioenergy facility at Avonmouth,” the spokeswoman said. “The application will be heard and determined by the Development Control Committee A on Wednesday, November 5.

“All the parties who have made comments about the scheme will be formally notified in due course and details of how they can engage in the committee process will be provided.

“The application is accompanied by an environmental statement, which assesses the impact of the proposals. Among other things, the statement looks at air quality and the noise impact. These factors will be fully considered before any decision is made.”

Conservative councillor for Avonmouth Wayne Harvey said yesterday it was “absolutely vital” that local people be allowed to have their say on the application.

Cllr Alex Woodman, chair of the committee that will now debate the merits of the plant, said that there had been “hardly any public response” until this weekend, but that officers had now changed their minds and recommended the plans be debated in public.

He added that a deadline for the local councillors to insist that the plans be debated by councillors had been missed.

Residents and campaigners opposed to the plant have cited fears over toxic, potentially carcinogenic, wood dust settling on residential areas, disposal of toxic ash that will be produced by the plant, and concerns over the technology that will be used. 

Cabinet member Cllr Gus Hoyt though said that while there was “real and genuine concern” and that the plans should be debated in public, he supported the technology in principle. 

The project also gained qualified support from Labour parliamentary candidate in Bristol North West, Darren Jones.

“I welcome the investment and job creation in the area,” he said. “But I see no reason why this should not be debated in public.”

But Jones said he wanted Avonmouth to develop so that it didn’t simply become “a place where we burn things”.

“I would rather we have good quality businesses there. I visited residents there two weeks ago and could see the dust settling. I get what they are protesting about. 

“Bristol City Council and the local enterprise partnership need to stand up for these communities and create a strategic vision where good businesses can set up and mitigate their impact on the environment.”

View the plans in detail and have your say here…

Picture: A biomass power plant with wood fuel / Shutterstock