By Andrew Clarke

Published at 11:10, Thursday, 26 April 2012

A SERIES of wind turbine planning applications were set to go before Copeland Council this week.

Members of Copeland’s planning panel were set to hear applications for three single turbines and one meteorological mast when they met yesterday.

Three of the applications fall in the Egremont area.

Planners were expected to give permission for a small domestic turbine on land near Ellerbeck Barns, Egremont.

The land already hosts one turbine, and the primary use for the new 15m turbine would be to power the applicant’s self-catering holiday cottage.

The application was the subject of one objection, from a neighbour concerned about visual intrusion and noise.

Planners are, however, expected to refuse an application for a 79.6m-high single turbine at Yeorton Hall Farm, at Haile.

It has been proposed to erect the 500kw turbine on an agricultural field, but has been met with strong local opposition.

Haile and Wilton Parish Council has raised concerns about visual impact, noise pollution and environmental impact, while 13 letters of objection have been sent to the council describing the turbine as “a unnecessary blot on a beautiful landscape”.

Councillors were recommended to refuse the application because “it would introduce an isolated prominent feature, incongruous in its surroundings which would have a materially harmful effect on the character and appearance of the surrounding landscape”.

In a further application, councillors are being recommended to approve a 50m-high meteorological mast close to Oxenriggs Farm, near Egremont.

Its purpose is to collect data to assess the location as a possible site for wind energy development.

Haile and Wilton Parish Council has also objected to this plan, and six individual letters of objection have been received.

And councillors are expected to agree to visit the site of a single 74m turbine proposed for land close to Watch Hill, Low Moresby.

The decisions come only days after senior county councillors raised concerns about Cumbria having to shoulder an unfair burden in terms of new wind turbines being built.

A lobby group of anti-wind farm protestors attended the council’s AGM in Kendal last week as part of a national day of action for wind farm opposition groups.

The county council is not the planning authority which determines applications for new wind turbines, although it is a statutory consultee on strategically significant new schemes. That is why campaigners raised their concerns and frustrations about the planning system with the county council, and also thanked councillors for their ongoing support in trying to halt the onward march of new turbines across the county.

County councillor Tim Knowles, Cabinet member responsible for environment, said: “The county council is aware of the increasing alarm and frustration in some of our communities about the impacts of wind turbines on many of our cherished landscapes outside the designated areas of the National Parks and Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty.

“Alongside this awareness is an acknowledgement that Cumbria has played, and will continue to play, a major role in addressing the nation’s low-carbon energy needs. This is why we are at the forefront of the debate on how Cumbria can take forward the Government’s policy of new nuclear build and are keen to explore how other renewable technologies can be promoted.

“However, we are becoming increasingly concerned that for the county to play its full and proper role in supporting the nation’s low carbon energy mix, that Government and the renewable energy sector do not see us as having limitless capacity to accommodate every new proposal for a wind turbine.”

Eddie Martin, leader of Cumbria County Council, said Cumbria is home to more wind turbines than the combined total of 22 other home county areas.

“The plethora of wind farms creeping across the county are against the wishes of the majority of local people,” he said.

Published by http://www.whitehavennews.co.uk