Fylde windfarm cabling alternative ‘not considered’
Government accused of failing to consider proposal to reduce length of a huge trench needed to connect windfarms
The government has been accused of failing to fully consider a proposal that would have reduced by more than 80 percent the length of the huge trench needed to connect a pair of windfarms off the Fylde coast to the national grid.
Ministers last week gave the green light to the 18-mile onshore cabling route suggested by the applicants behind the already approved ‘Morgan and Morecambe’ offshore windfarm projects, which could power as many as two million homes.
However, a group of parish councils says the decision disregarded the major environmental and economic benefits of an alternative option that they and other local authorities had put on the table.
It comes as the Morgan and Morecambe project team issued its first statement since the government announcement, pledging to continue “working closely with communities and stakeholders, listening to local views and working together to minimise impacts and deliver lasting benefits”.
The approved route will see an at least 100-metre-wide ditch dug for more than 10 miles across the Fylde – across agricultural land and also through greenbelt – from St. Annes to two new substations being built between Freckleton and Newton-with Scales, which will convert the windfarm energy for transfer to the national grid. The 1.8-metre-deep channel will then continue at a slightly reduced width for another eight miles, heading through Preston and South Ribble to a grid connection point at Penwortham.
While so-called ‘trenchless’ techniques will be used for laying the cables at the points where they cross particularly sensitive sites and the road network – avoiding any direct impact at ground level – the prospect of such extensive excavation has prompted widespread local opposition.
However, back in April – while the government was still considering whether or not to grant a so-called development consent order (DCO) for the chosen route – Lancashire County Council, Fylde Council and Wyre Council submitted a report making the economic case for preparing the energy for the grid via an existing substation at Stanah, near Thornton-Cleveleys, or a new one within the adjacent Hillhouse Technology Enterprise Zone.
That alternative would truncate the cabling trench by 15 miles – from 18 miles to just three. It proposed that existing overhead powerlines would then be used to carry the electricity to Penwortham and into the national grid.
The dossier – which the county and borough authorities commissioned from consultancy firm Genecon – built an evidence base for a proposal previously suggested by Newton with Clifton and Freckleton parish councils, together with a Fylde area energy working group established by the Lancashire Association of Local Councils (LALC).
The report claimed that the shorter underground route would more than halve the £443m estimated cost of the two windfarms. However, it said that savings could be even greater if the Morgan and Morecambe schemes were co-ordinated with a third windfarm – the Mooir Vannin – also proposed for the Irish Sea and also currently expected to be connected to the national grid at Penwortham.
In a scenario where all three projects were hooked up via Stanah or Hillhouse, it was claimed they could be delivered for £326.5m – more than 60 percent less than their current £845m combined projected cost. That saving, it was suggested, could help “rescue the viability” of the Morgan project, whose parent companies pulled out in January, leaving that scheme in search of new backers.
The blueprint judged that the option could also support 1,100 additional jobs at the Hillhouse Enterprise Zone, “driven by the arrival of energy-generating uses and subsequent energy-intensive industrial uses” – generating a local economic boost of at least £1bn by 2040.
The alternative route would negate the need for the new substations west of Newton-with-Scales and north east of Freckleton, which would collectively span 22 hectares.
The report concluded that the option is “technically feasible and offers vastly superior economic and financial outcomes compared to the current…proposal”. It added that the findings merited “a pause” in the government decision so that they could be assessed further and more evidence gathered.
The fact ministers did not take up that suggestion was, according to LALC – which represents all of the Lancashire’s parish and town councils – a failure to adhere to the government’s own guidance on issuing DCOs, which says it must have regard to “local impact reports” and “any other matters the Secretary of State thinks are both important and relevant”.
LALC chair Pat Hastings told the LDRS she did not believe the alternative route had been given “the structured and independent testing it deserved”.
She added: “This is where our frustration is greatest. The government had the time and mechanisms available to seek further information.
“Local authorities had the knowledge and were willing to provide evidence. The economic work was undertaken using the government’s own ‘Green Book’ methodology.”
Cllr Hastings, who also chairs Broughton Parish Council, noted that the decision came just days after the National Audit Office published a report stating that most energy transmission projects were not subject to “a whole-system” assessment of alternatives.
“We are not saying that Lancashire should have been given special treatment.
“We are asking why evidence of a potentially lower-cost, higher-growth national solution was not subjected to the same level of scrutiny that the government itself now says is necessary for the transmission system.
“The national interest and the Lancashire interest may actually be aligned here,” Cllr Hastings said.
The three parish councils for Freckleton, Newton with Clifton, and Treales, Roseacre and Wharles – along with St. Annes on the Sea Town Council – all lodged objections to the proposed transmission plans. Concerns included the claimed potential for permanent damage to the agricultural land crossed by the cables – spanning around 45 farms, of all types – even after its restoration.
The submission from Newton with Clifton Parish Council suggested that the buried cables will pose long-term challenges beneath “mossy and marshy” land, because of the “recognised risk” that they will “rise over time, which will compromise field operations”.
The LDRS approached the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero for a response to the LALC comments, but was directed to the published letter outlining its reasons for approving the Morgan and Morecambe cabling route. The Planning Inspectorate undertook an assessment of the application for the windfarm transmission infrastructure before the government made its final decision.
The letter noted the position of National Grid Electricity Transmission Plc – which operates the electricity transmission network in England and Wales – that connecting the windfarms to Stanah would require installing “additional equipment, significantly increasing the size of the substation, and a new high-voltage overhead line to transmit the power to Penwortham”.
It added that the parish councils and the LALC energy working group “did not appear to have included the costs of these upgrades in their estimated savings”.
The Inspectorate concluded that the Stanah option was “an immature and inchoate suggestion that should carry very little weight in the planning balance”
It also found that, overall, the applicants had paid “adequate regard to site selection and alternatives”.
Nevertheless, the Planning Inspectorate ultimately recommended that the DCO be “withheld” on the basis that the “negative impacts of the transmission infrastructure outweighed the positive impacts”.
However, the government – after requesting further information from interested parties over a period of five months – granted approval for the route, concluding that the “various harms” likely to be caused by the development had “reduced sufficiently” and that the benefits of the project now “clearly outweighed” them.
Fylde Council said it was taking legal advice in the wake of the decision.
Alternative route ‘a challenge that could be managed’
The option of transferring the windfarm-generated energy to a substation at Stanah or the Hillhouse Enterprise Zone would mean bringing the cabling onshore at Rossall, rather than St. Annes beach.
According to an initial high-level assessment of the alternative underground route, it would have to pass through existing built development and “environmentally sensitive areas”.
However, a review carried out for the subsequent Genecon report concluded that while some sections of the route “intersects natural habitats and will require ecological consideration…the majority of it follows main roads consisting of developed land and sealed surfaces with minimal ecological value”.
It adds that further investigation is recommended, but stresses the expectation is that “best practice construction methods could be followed to mitigate any potential impacts on priority habitats, watercourses and protected species”.
“Standard mitigation methods are suggested to counteract any potential (but as yet unknown) adverse environmental and ecological impacts, but the overall conclusion is certainly not one of ‘high adverse impact’,” the report states.
‘We’ll keep listening to locals’
It could be up to five years before work on the cabling route begins, with the laying of the independent infrastructure for each of the Morgan and Morecambe windfarms potentially being undertaken consecutively over the course of a decade.
The Morgan and Morecambe project team told the LDRS: “We are pleased with the decision made by the Secretary of State on 14th September.
“We would like to thank everyone who has taken part in the independent examination process, as well as local stakeholders and communities who have engaged with us and shared their views throughout the development of our plans.
“As we move towards detailed design, we remain committed to working closely with communities and stakeholders, listening to local views and working together to minimise impacts and deliver lasting benefits.
“We recognise there will be questions about the next steps and further information will be shared in due course. In the meantime, we would encourage anyone with questions to contact us.”