The applicant is requested to provide information on other sites either in their control or operated by another company where the proposed working technique is used successfully.
DCC asked this question, in its Reg22 request, because:
The MPA will wish to consider whether the proposed working technique is a "novel approach" as set out in the NPPF Paragraph: 048 Reference ID: 27-048-20140306 in respect of the requirements for guarantees on the amelioration of impacts on local water supplies should there be any technical failure.
How telling that Aggregate Industries could not point to a single other site where its unorthodox seasonal working scheme has been tried before 8.5.
Should the 100 or so people who rely on the site for their clean and uninterrupted drinking water be delighted that they could be part of this new experiment?
Not if AI’s Reg22 response is anything to go by. AI's water consultants have changed their tune since 2015, and now claim:
By working only to the MWWT then during the summer months the water table will be lower. Therefore across the areas being worked the zone of water level fluctuation is undisturbed. This zone is at least 1m thick. 2.2.8
AI says:
The proposal to dry-dig to the MWWT and no lower at any point in the year, for the duration of the development, actually preserves between 2 and 5 metres of BSPB above the Aylesbeare Mudstone Formation. 8.5
In reality, however, there are large parts of the site that have very little or no zone of water level fluctuation to allow a 1m ‘freeboard’ between the maximum winter water table and the summer water level; Amec previously confirmed this in 2015:
In reality, digging to the MWWT at PZ05 would preserve 0m of BSPB above the Aylesbeare Mudstone Formation. Here's the log for PZ05 - which is towards the middle of the site.
If AI can’t provide any examples of its unorthodox scheme, its architect can now at least point to some "cartoons" instead. In the minutes of a meeting with the Environment Agency:
EB to include "cartoons" showing method of working
Here are those cartoons. Locals, whose water supplies are at risk, will draw their own conclusions.
