Site last updated on 05 August 2007

7:12 AM

Beware: New Test Anemometer Application

We have recently had notification that an application for Full Planning Permission has been received by the EYRC which proposes the “Erection of a guyed 80m high temporary anemometry mast at Land West of Rotsea Farm. Rotsea Lane. Rotsea. East Riding of Yorkshire”.
The Applicant is RES UK and Ireland Ltd.

You may remember that the original planning permission for erection of a test anemometer, granted in 2006, was for a limited period only – for 2 years – (that is why there is need, on the developer’s part, for this new application).We believe that, effectively, this is a request to extend the lifetime of the present anemometer.

If there is some benefit to be had from this application, it is the salutary one of reminding people that RES Ltd haven’t gone away and that a wind farm in your back yard remains a real possibility. Moreover, it is worth remembering that no application to build the wind-farm itself has so far been received and that whatever has so far been proposed, (10 turbines of 125 meters height), may bear little resemblance to what is actually applied for, when that time comes. It occurs to me also that there aren’t too many wind-anemometers presently erected in the East Riding. Do you think any future application for a wind-farm is strengthened or weakened by the previously granted presence of a test-anemometer at the application site? Will the claims of a developer upon your neighbourhood be stronger, (than the claims of other developers upon other places), if it is only your locality that has a standing test anemometer?

Clearly, a strong response by way of objection to this new application sends the right message to RES Ltd, (and indeed to the relevant landowners who remain determined – apparently – to bring a wind-farm to your area).

The application title in full reads.
Application for Strategic – Full Planning Permission. Proposal: Erection of a guyed 80m high temporary anemometry mast at Land West of Rotsea Farm Rotsea Lane Rotsea East Riding of Yorkshire.
Applicant: RES UK and Ireland Ltd.

NB). You have only until Friday 7th May to respond to this application. And if you do respond you must quote the reference number DC/09/04437/STPLF/STRAT/SHO.
(I would quote the Application Title given above as well).

You may send your objection by letter to:
Mr Peter Ashcroft. Head of Planning and Development Management. County Hall. Beverley. East Riding of Yorkshire. HU17 9BA.

Or you may object electronically by e-mailing beverley.dc@eastriding.gov.uk.
You can also object online. Details for this can be found on the Planning Public Access Site at http://www.eastriding.gov.uk/myarea/disclaimer.asp. Tick the box and submit and you will be taken to this public access site. On the left click “Search online planning applications” and enter the Application Number 09/04437/STPLF and search and then click to view. To file your objection click the tab “Important dates” where there is a button “Submit comments” where your objection may be submitted.

You should clearly label your reply with the word OBJECTION, (if that is what it is).

All of us are busy in our lives but I do urge you to take the time to object, (I accept it is a chore).

Here are a few points/suggestions of my own

1). You must keep your objection against the Test Anemometer itself. Failure to do so will probably invalidate your objection.

2). At the time of the first application for the present anemometer, (in 2006), a sentiment offered to the planning committee by one of its members, (a supporter of the application), was that it should go ahead because the information it gathered within its proposed lifetime, could show whether a wind-farm at Rotsea might, or might not, be justified.

But why should the developers be allowed more time than was originally gifted to them? Why do they need longer? The test anemometer, (remember it is a test anemometer) has been standing for nearly 3 years now and no application to build the wind-farm itself has been received. It is difficult, therefore to see justification either for the retention of the anemometer that is presently there or for building a new one.

3). Since the Test Anemometer has been standing for 3 years the Developers would seem to be in breach of the original planning permission, (which was for 2 years only). Is this a matter of indifference to the ERYC?

4). The test anemometer is an alien feature in the landscape which harms that appearance of the landscape. It is detrimental to the visual amenity of the area, (there is nothing else of its height in the area). It is a continuing hazard to birds

5). The Council’s antipathy to wind-farm proliferation in East Yorkshire is well known, (and has been publicly and loudly declared). Why aid and abet the ambitions of these wind-farm developers now?

6) In the ERYC’s own Draft Interim Planning Document “Planning For Renewable Energy Developments” published in September 2008, the whole nearby vicinity of the River Hull from Beverley to Driffield including the vicinity of the the Frodingham Beck and the Driffield Canal were accorded the high “Natural Heritage Sensitivity Recommendation” of “Zone 2”. The Wolds is similarly categorised as Zone 2 according to these criteria and there are no areas of the highest sensitivity, (Zone 1), in the whole of East Yorkshire. Given points (2), (3), (4) and (5) – and even if they had given an earlier approval for a test anemometer at Rotsea, (but in 2006) – in the light of the later publication of this document, (in 2008), why would the ERYC want to renew approval, (in 2010), for a test anemometer so close to, if not in, a Zone 2 area.

Please object because the number of objectors matters (even if what you say is very brief and even if all you do is re-state just one, and only one, of the points above – though I would urge you to make as many points as you can).

For more information please contact us using the form below.

Mission Statement

Wolds WindFarm Opposition has been formed to continually develop, prepare, present and implement strategies and tactics to oppose the current and any subsequent planned developments of a windfarm between the villages of Skerne, Hutton, Cranswick and Watton.

A YORKSHIRE WATER nature reserve can boast another feather in its cap after the sighting of a rare great white egret this week. *

Fewer than 100 of the birds have been recorded in the UK, all of them vagrants lost on their way to their normal summer breeding grounds in eastern and central Europe.

* The site at Top Hill Low is on land adjacent to the proposed Rotsea Wind Farm.

For more on this story click here

THE EGRET HAS LANDED !