11 June 2017 Revised Power Plant Scheme without Diesel Questions & Answers

Transcription

1 11 June 2017 Revised Power Plant Scheme without Diesel Questions & Answers Robinson, Chairman of Hacheston Parish Council, has had discussions with Ben Guest and Dr Marc Thomas of Noriker Power Ltd. between 8 11 June about revised plans which remove diesel generation from the Rapid Response Power Plant altogether: 8 June :09 Ben Guest Date: Thu, Jun 8, 2017 at 6:09 PM Subject: Noriker Power Battery Project at Wickham Market - No More Diesel To: Hacheston Parish Clerk Cc: Marc Thomas Dear Bart, As promised, I am delighted to report that we have been able to revise our scheme such that we now have no diesel generators on the Wickham Market battery project. This is possible thanks to our implementing technology that allows us to effectively split our site into a battery one (at Wickham Market) and a diesel generation one (about 200 miles away to the west on an industrial estate in Hereford). The fundamental design and operation of the scheme has not really changed, we have simply found a way to move the engines a very long way away. This is being done at our cost and we do hope the Hacheston community will be pleased with this development. Noriker is delighted to be able to offer this solution. The revised layout and related planning statement are attached and these have been shared with the planning officer. The impact of this is: Zero emissions (NOx, SOx, soot/particulates or CO2). No noise from engines. This reduces overall noise by over 50%. This is an improvement on the positive information we shared a week ago (in the form of emissions and noise reports) which showed acceptable results. Without Diesel generators it will now be a lot quieter still. I was also asked by, your Chairman, if there was any risk of creep (further development) in this location. I checked with the original applicant for the grid capacity and can confirm that with this project we are mopping up the available capacity at the 132kV substation at Wickham Market, so no further connections such as ours could be done without the grid company investing heavily in their infrastructure over many years to upgrade the grid. I would like to provide a clear illustration of how low-impact this project is and therefore the best option for your community: With this site being used for frequency response, it crowds out other options. What is being connected here is a small scheme (less than half an hectare) which will most of the time use less than 10% of the available grid capacity (i.e. will operate at around +/-5MW almost all the time) and this is not even generation but battery charging and discharging which is quiet by nature. Instead, another developer could have proposed (and may still if we are rejected) a renewable scheme exporting 50MW (this would be 250 acres of solar) or a gas generation scheme at 50MW with all the noise and polluting effects that would have. Even our previous design only used 6MW of diesel intermittently. Now that is zero. We genuinely do hope this scheme is the most acceptable use of the capacity at this location to all parishioners. DC/17/1407 Noriker Revised Power Plant Questions and Answers Page 1

2 In terms of our planning application, we do believe we now have a scheme that has no cause to be rejected, however, if there are any remaining objections we would be keen to address them, if we can. We do have a strong desire that we need not go to committee on 20 July. This would save us 5-6 weeks from today and we will have some reduced costs and more time, and we can share this benefit with the community. We note that you are expecting to receive a referral form which would need responding to within 5 days. I would like to ask your Parish and your councilors what they might want in terms of recompense or planning gain to win us this time and to show support in the referral form. We are happy to put our best foot forward and offer a contribution of 20,000 to the parish council but we wait for the council s and parish s advice as to what they might like to agree at their earliest convenience. This proposal does have a natural shelf life as the closer we get to the planning committee date, the less beneficial it can be. We apologise for creating some time pressure but is unavoidable. I would like to reassure that whatever is agreed or otherwise, that Noriker will now only be implementing a battery-only scheme. We look forward to hearing from you soon. Yours sincerely Ben Guest 10 June :08 Robinson SMS Ben - further to our telcon on , we have been advised of your revised proposal via SCDC. This has raised a lot of discussion and questions amongst residents. Has a new noise assessment been submitted, if not when will it be available. Have you specified the type of acoustic treatment you will be installing for the new scheme. What info / details can you share with us about the other site that will host the diesels. Is this site confirmed / consented etc, do you have agreement to operate in this manner ( practically and commercially). Are you able to guarantee that no diesels will ever be installed at Hachrston or the capacity of the site increased. Any info you can provide before residents meeting on 12th would be helpful. Rgds Robinson DC/17/1407 Noriker Revised Power Plant Questions and Answers Page 2

3 11 June :32 Ben Guest Sent: 11 June :32 To: Hacheston Parish Clerk Cc: Marc Thomas; Robinson Subject: Fwd: Noriker Power Battery Project at Wickham Market - No More Diesel Dear Thank you again for the time to speak last week. Thank you also for your text message with additional questions. For convenience, I have pasted your message here below and inserted replies in italics and sent this to you and the parish clerk, as requested. Meanwhile, if you or your residents would like Noriker to attend, even for a short while, the residents' meeting on Monday we would be very happy to do so (even if it's only to discuss theplanning gain we have offered, for example, or to clarify any of the information provided). Answers follow: "Ben - further to our telcon on , we have been advised of your revised proposal via SCDC. This has raised a lot of discussion and questions amongst residents. Has a new noise assessment been submitted, if not when will it be available?" The noise assessment modelled the noise from all the equipment, including the generators. Even with the generators the modelling outcome was lower than the quietest measured noise from the assessment at each of the three measurement locations (including the Old Hall). So noise wasn't a problem even with the generators. Now that they are gone it can only get quieter! We have already cleared the updated scheme with the noise EHO. He is responding directly to the noise consultant in the community "Have you specified the type of acoustic treatment you will be installing for the new scheme?" Of course, this is an important question. The answer is that we are keeping all the original acoustic treatment, with the exception of the internal acoustic barrier that surrounded the generators themselves. So the perimeter acoustic barriers will remain as before. This means that all the assumptions in the acoustic modelling are valid. "What info / details can you share with us about the other site that will host the diesels. Is this site confirmed / consented etc, do you have agreement to operate in this manner ( practically and commercially)." Yes, we can share some details with you, of course. It is a site owned by an affiliate that has agreed for their site to be used by us. It is already built and operating (so no new net diesel generation installed anywhere now). We do of course have permission from National Grid to split our site in this manner. Hopefully this can be seen as a victory for all; Noriker doesn't want more fossil fuel generation any more than absolutely necessary either." "Are you able to guarantee that no diesels will ever be installed at Hachrston or the capacity of the site increased?" This is re-confirmed. 1. We will not install diesel here ever - now or in future. 2. We will not and cannot expand this project for reasons explained (specifically that there is no further grid capacity). "Any info you can provide before residents meeting on 12th would be helpful. Rgds Robinson" I hope this is all helpful. I am glad it is spurring some discussion. Hopefully at the very least we can be seen as the 'least worst' choice for a development at this location. Kind regards, Ben Guest DC/17/1407 Noriker Revised Power Plant Questions and Answers Page 3

4 11 June :42 Robinson On 11 Jun 2017, at 14:42, Robinson wrote: Ben Thanks for your response. Unfortunately it doesn t help me a lot. 1. Residents have little confidence in the SCDC planning and EHO enforcement officers having already been on the wrong end of a couple of schemes they were content with. What I really wanted to see was a noise assessment by your consultant which predicted the noise levels etc from the new scheme which we could have discussed. Simply being told its all ok and that it can only be quieter won t cut much ice. 2. Can you tell more detail about the other site ie, name and location of the site, operating company, operating history etc Residents are adamant that they do not want Noriker at the meeting on 12 th. Finally with regard to the Northern boundary, in his letter of the owner of the hedge and ditch, Mr John Kelleway confirms that the hedge & ditch are on his land & he doesn t want to add any more vegetation. This means that part of visual mitigation for Parham Old Hall & the public footpath is nul & void, which is particularly important in the 5 winter months. Has a new scheme been agreed with SCDC. Regards DC/17/1407 Noriker Revised Power Plant Questions and Answers Page 4

5 11 June :21 Ben Guest Sent: 11 June :21 To: Robinson Cc: Marc Thomas; Bartholomew Hall Subject: Re: Noriker Power Battery Project at Wickham Market - No More Diesel Thank you for your quick reply. I am conscious I had mistyped Bart's address on my last (now correct in this reply). Addressing point 1: I do sincerely appreciate your wish to support and do the best for your community and that you are dissatisfied with prior decisions by SDBC but it is also saddening and disheartening to us that you also believe Noriker are being dishonest, despite our huge efforts on design and on community engagement (even if this did start later than you would have liked, I admit). On the noise reports - these are carried out independently not by the EHO or the planning officer and the authors have their own reputations to uphold, as do we. This is all proper work. To try and break down where your concerns may still be coming from, may I ask if you were unhappy with the first noise report? If so why? Because, if you think about it, if that report was correctly carried out (which it was) and it said we were as quiet as a recording studio(!) at the points of observation which is well inside planning guidelines - I believe one of your parishioners was reaching a similar conclusion to those in the noise report at our PC meeting as he worked the numbers out in front of us - can you not believe that by removing 12 engines rated at 0.5MW it wouldn't be quieter? There are NO other changes to the scheme other than the removal of engines. This is now a site with mostly just fans creating most of the limited noise. No engines! Not sure how else to be more convincing. Addressing point 2: I will discuss with my colleagues if we can divulge more than we have about the other site. May I ask why this information is important to you in the meantime? On point 3: I will revert on the visual impact you refer to. I am not sure I fully agree with your conclusion but will double check and reply asap. We won't attend tomorrow. We were just trying to be helpful in suggesting this. It is more difficult to "engage" if this is the parish's approach however, I hope you agree. I do hope,, that you can see this is a sensible scheme that is very, very quiet and has no emissions whatsoever, the two most common concerns. Please do reply to my question about what concerns you might have about the initial noise report and why you require more detail about the second site (to know if it really exists?) so that I can understand your perspective a little better. Kind regards, Ben Ben Guest DC/17/1407 Noriker Revised Power Plant Questions and Answers Page 5

6 11 June :53 Marc Thomas From: Marc Thomas Sent: 11 June :53 To: Ben Guest; Robinson Cc: Bartholomew Hall Subject: Re: Noriker Power Battery Project at Wickham Market - No More Diesel I can address point 3: Mr Kelleway owns the northern boundary of the ditch. Originally we had been informed by our landowner's agent that our landowner did, however this misunderstanding has since been cleared up. It is naturally more pleasing to restore an existing neglected hedge, and keep to the traditional hedge lines, and we are still happy to do this with Mr Kelleway's permission, but this will only come with your support. The current scheme is that we will merely move the planting to our side of the ditch. The screening effect will be identical. There was also some concern over the type of planting. We are required to use native species. Within this constraint, perhaps the residents would like to suggest what planting they would like to see here? kind regards Marc 11 June :40 Robinson From: Robinson Sent: 11 June :40 To: Marc Thomas; Ben Guest Cc: Bartholomew Hall Subject: RE: Noriker Power Battery Project at Wickham Market - No More Diesel Ben, Marc I ll try one last time to help you 1. You re latest scheme consists of 23 Inverters, 23 transformers, 8 A type battery storage (with cooling fans?) and 18 B type storage (with cooling fans?). All these things will generate noise. You know what noise they will create as it must have formed part of your previous assessments of the noise profile. Some residents have already suffered for a long period due to noise from the existing sub-station transformers so they want to understand the noise profile that will come from this new proposal. I think we can all appreciate that there will be less noise but people want to understand the type and quantity of noise that will now be produced. Will your new method of operation make the equipment work harder and produce more / different noise than previously projected. If the information about the noise that will now be produced is in one of your previous noise reports please point that out. 2. Residents are curious about where this other site has appeared from and want reassurance that it does exist and will be able to do what you say and that if it cant that you wont just install the engines once you have your unopposed planning consent What you have to accept is that as a consequence of Noriker s late and poor communications strategy residents are very sceptical about anything that is put forward by yourselves. Best Regards DC/17/1407 Noriker Revised Power Plant Questions and Answers Page 6

7 11 June :17 Ben Guest Sent: 11 June :27 To: and Alison Robinson Cc: Marc Thomas; Bartholomew Hall Subject: Re: Noriker Power Battery Project at Wickham Market - No More Diesel Dear Thank you for your . It seems to me that our biggest challenge is one of winning your trust. Because the facts are clear: There are no emissions now, the noise is very low, the visual impact is diminishingly small. Neither good self nor some parishioners seem prepared to trust or believe the information, however. Whatever the reason is (that you just don't want development of any kind, or are jaded by previous experience, or are unhappy that we started communicating later than desired) we have strived to show our good faith and made big efforts to improve the situation from one that is good to one that has so very little impact at all. From what you have kindly shared with me, you are a highly experienced ex-developer. Therefore you have all the knowledge of planning law and all the requisite ability to understand what has been put in front of you and to interpret it correctly. Therefore, as you know planning requirements, you would know to tell your parishioners that our noise report is very good, you would have read that we have clearly stated in our revised planning statement that the equipment on the site will operate as before (why have you asked us if the batteries will worker harder when we have said they won't for example?). Where you could genuinely help us is to look at this development objectively and tell your parishioners: 1. That this scheme is good - it makes negligible noise and has no emissions and has no meaningful visual impact. 2. It sucks up all future development potential at that location and is therefore a terrific way to avoid future generation capacity being located there. 3. That we cannot flout the law and just plonk Diesel engines on the site after we have planning if diesel is not given planning (which it now won't). Why aren't you telling your parishioners about planning law rather than letting them believe they are powerless? It would be a serious breach to do what you suggest. Did you happen to do that or something? I just don't know where you get the idea that you think we could do that. It's just not helpful to let this nervous thinking to build- especially when you won't now let us talk to your parishioners to address this. It's not healthy or right. I want nonetheless to address one point on the "types" of noise as this seems to be a concern that was brought up at the PC meeting we attended in the context of "hum". The fact that the substation next door is so loud - which is what I think people worry will be replicated and thus doubled by virtue of our site going ahead - is because it is a massive primary substation operating at 132,000 volts feeding power to thousands, maybe tens of thousands of homes and businesses. Ours site is just one connection off that substation with equipment operating at no more than 700 volts, a tiny fraction, with much of it containerised (ie sound-insulated). It is simply a much lower category of power throughout. Please be reassured that the noise report confirms that rather than being some lie. Please do look objectively at what is written on the reports and in our revised planning statement. Only then hopefully people will begin to see the fears around this site have got out of hand. You can truly "help us" and everyone in this way. Thank you very much in advance. Kind regards Ben DC/17/1407 Noriker Revised Power Plant Questions and Answers Page 7