News / Environment
Diesel power plant application back on table
Resubmitted plans for a diesel power plant in St Philips have triggered hundreds of objections from campaigners and local residents.
Plutus Energy withdrew previous efforts, following protests, to build a plant of backup diesel generators to feed into the National Grid’s subsidised Stor programme.
But the company’s new plans, submitted to the council on March 10, have already attracted almost 300 objections centred around noise and air pollution.
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The new proposals have been tweaked from last time, with Plutus Energy now promising “low carbon, bio-diesel powered generators”.
But campaign group Rade Bristol (Residents against Dirty Energy), set up to fight the previous application, said they are suspicious about the new claims.
“By specifying HVO bio-diesel it means they can revert to fossil diesel at any time in the future if they wish or costs dictate,” Bruce Yates, from the group, told Bristol24/7.
The new application emerged after initial plans from Plutus Energy were proposed in November 2015. Campaign groups like Rade Bristol and BS2Greenspace fought hard against the plans which were withdrawn in December of that year. Within a week, the council had turned down separate plans for a gas powered plant.
Lawrence Hill councillor Margaret Hickman, Labour, said that she was concerned Plutus would run the power plant more than its allocated 15 times a year.
She added that she fears that children at the St Philip’s Marsh Nursery School would be subjected to harmful pollution. “It’s the prevailing winds, not to mention the main road going to Bath. There’s an extremely high prevalence of children with asthma in that area,” she said.
She called for the council to move towards making Bristol a no-go zone for fosil fuel power plants subsidised under the Government’s Stor programme.
Bristol24/7 contacted Plutus Energy, but they declined to comment.
Pictured top: How a diesel power plant may look, according to the St Philips planning application.
Read more: ‘Not in our city’