November 23, 2015
England

Defeated wind farm firm: We may put in a fresh application for Hamsterley Forest

Teesdale Mercury | 22/11/2015 | www.teesdalemercury.co.uk

A countryside campaign group is celebrating after learning that there will be no appeal against the rejection of a wind farm development near Hamsterley.
But Banks Renewables, which proposed to put up four 125m turbines at Windy Bank Farm at a cost of £16m, maintains the site is ideal and there may be new proposals in the future.
Durham County Council rejected the proposal in May and the six-month window for an appeal against the decision closed on November 6.
Banks Renewables blamed the “current Government’s disposition against onshore wind farms” as the main reason for not taking the project forward. Lewis Stokes, development relations coordinator at Banks Renewables, said: “The Windy Bank site is wholly suitable for the type of development we were proposing, and it might well be that either Banks Renewables or another developer returns with a new planning application at some point in the future.”
Hamsterley and Upper Gaunless Action Group (HUGAG), which opposed the application, said it was relieved that there would be no appeal.
A spokesperson said: “We have spent the past six months assembling the arguments that we are totally confident would have validated our case at appeal. For over seven years the overwhelming majority of local people have staunchly stood against what we all perceived as a totally inappropriate location for an industrial development of this nature. We are only now starting to digest the enormity of this outcome and we still have a lot of work to do. We are by no means feeling triumphalist, we are only hugely relieved that the right decision has been taken in favour of the countryside.”

URL to article:  https://www.wind-watch.org/news/2015/11/23/defeated-wind-farm-firm%e2%80%88we-may-put-in-a-fresh-application-for-hamsterley-forest/