Aggregate Industries is no longer in any rush to quarry Straitgate Farm – judging by documents lodged last year in support of the company's ROMP application DCC/3655/2014 for Hillhead, an application submitted in 2014 but still not determined. AI’s document says:
Should Straitgate Farm obtain planning permission in 2018, extraction would likely commence in 2021. 2.13
That’s quite a change – a 5-year change in fact – from what AI originally intended, if we ignore the 1967 planning application.
AI’s recent application to quarry Straitgate Farm has been beset by delays. Straitgate was originally lined up as the replacement for Venn Ottery Quarry in 2016. As AI’s Request for Scoping Opinion in January 2015 made clear:
It is... necessary to plan for additional reserves being available from mid-2016. The sand and gravel reserves at Straitgate Farm are considered to be a direct replacement for reserves at Venn Ottery. 3.1
Subject to planning consent, it is therefore proposed that mineral processing from Straitgate Farm would take place initially at Blackhill Quarry for a period of approximately 4-5 years until the end of 2021. 3.2
Nothing much had changed by the time AI made its planning application later in that year:
In 2016, when the proposed development is anticipated to commence, the estimated tonnage of extracted materials from the site will be 295,000 tonnes. By 2017, when the site is fully operational, the estimated extraction tonnage will be 410,000 tonnes per year. This will continue throughout the life of the site. 3.27
As longstanding readers will know, that application was pulled, only to be replaced by another in 2017. By that time the plan had changed, and AI proposed to haul each load of as-dug material 23 miles from Straitgate to Hillhead near Uffculme to be processed with mobile plant. Later, fixed plant from Blackhill was relocated to Hillhead, but even then AI expected that:
the plant will be installed and operational by mid-late 2018... when, subject to planning, mineral would begin to be imported from Straitgate Farm into Hillhead Quarry. 8.4
So, first 2016, then 2018, and now 2021. How on earth, you might wonder, can AI produce a full range of products in this region for so long – for 5 years – without having access to the "gravel-rich" deposits of Straitgate Farm?
On multiple occasions, AI has argued that the Straitgate reserves are crucial to its future operations in this region, that without Straitgate it wouldn’t be able to supply the area with its full range of products, including high polished stone value material for road surfacing:
The gravel content [at Straitgate] is important as it is capable of producing a 57 PSV aggregate suitable for road surfacing. 5.4.5
We were told that AI could not rely exclusively on its 4 million tonnes of sand and gravel at Houndaller – next door to the company’s newly-erected processing plant at Hillhead. We were told that AI was not ready to exploit the 8 million tonnes at Penslade – also next door to the company’s newly-erected processing plant at Hillhead. We were told in 2017:
The gravel rich Straitgate mineral would complement the material currently being extracted at Houndaller (Hillhead) Quarry since the Houndaller deposit is sand-rich (75% sand to 25% gravel) of which there is little or no crushable gravel to produce a 57 PSV aggregate. 3.9.2
Others were told word-for-word the same thing last year in AI's document to support its ROMP application for Hillhead – even by different consultants:
The gravel rich Straitgate Farm mineral would complement the material currently being extracted at Houndaller (Hillhead) Quarry since the Houndaller deposit is sand-rich (75% sand to 25% gravel) of which there is little or no crushable gravel to produce a 57 PSV aggregate. 2.14
Importantly, DCC relied on such information from AI to justify Straitgate’s inclusion in the Devon Minerals Plan, claiming that Devon couldn’t just rely on the 12 million tonnes with and without permission at the northern end of the Budleigh Salterton Pebble Beds, that the 1 million tonnes at Straitgate at the southern end was needed too:
Information provided by the operator since 2011 indicates that the proportion of crushable gravel… within the BSPB decreases from south to north. While the proportion of crushable gravel in the Ottery St Mary area is not significantly lower than at the existing Blackhill and Venn Ottery quarries, the resource around Uffculme is much less gravel-rich. This further supports the need to consider future sand and gravel supply from both the northern and southern options. 4.15
And indeed, in the Devon Minerals Plan you will even find DCC bizarrely claiming that this would in some way minimise transportation distances:
... resources within this southern area have a higher crushable gravel content than those further north, indicating the importance of securing supply from that southern area. Maintaining the production of sand and gravel from the southern and northern parts of the Pebble Beds is also important in minimising transportation distances to the main markets in Devon and adjoining areas in accordance with Objective 1 and Policy M1. 5.4.8
With AI’s newly erected processing plant at Hillhead, 23 miles away from Straitgate Farm, minimising transportation distances is of course the last thing that the working of Straitgate would do. Transporting all of Straitgate’s 'as-dug' material – including the 20% waste – to Hillhead for processing would entail an unsustainable 2.5 million HGV miles. As AI again outlined in the ROMP document for Hillhead, this would be over a number of years on a campaign basis...
… depending on availability of transport. 2.15
But, in actual fact, it now turns out that AI is able to function quite happily, thank-you-very-much – for 5 years, thank-you-very-much – without the "gravel-rich" material from Straitgate Farm.
What about the "57 PSV aggregate" for road surfacing?
Only comparatively small amounts of high PSV material are needed each year, and as we posted in AI’s resurrected plant at Hillhead has enough material nearby to take it beyond 2050:
If you believe AI – and why would you after such a catalogue of fiction – and if you ignore the ever-increasing stockpiles of unprocessed quartzite pebbles at Houndaller – the problem with the company's argument is that it ignores the effective mileage that would be embodied in each tonne of high PSV material from Straitgate. We have posted about this before, how each 28.5 tonne load of high PSV material from Straitgate would necessitate a staggeringly unsustainable 417 miles of transportation for production, BEFORE any onward delivery. In other words, high PSV material from Straitgate would have to travel over 3x the return-trip distance of material from Greystone, an AI quarry in Cornwall also with high PSV material.
Operations at Houndaller recommenced more two years ago. DCC’s most recent monitoring report reminds us that, as of this month, planning consent has expired:
Houndaller contains an estimated reserve of 4.2 million tonnes of sand and gravel and extraction resumed on this part of the site on 16 September 2016. It is noted the planning consent expires on 31 December 2018 for the Houndaller area of the site. 4.9
The periodic review application seeks, amongst other amendments, to extend the consent for extraction in Houndaller (Schedule B conditions) beyond 2018 to 2037. 4.13
In the ROMP document for Hillhead, AI says:
As of July 2018, approximately 270,000 tonnes of material have been extracted since recommencement in January 2017. A reserve of approximately 4 million tonnes (saleable) remains in phases 5-8. 2.12
Since that time, there have of course been no howls of anguish from AI over shortages of "57 PSV aggregate". And if material from Straitgate Farm is now not 'needed' until 2021, if AI can do without Straitgate’s "gravel-rich" material for all that time, if AI is managing fine with the 4 million tonne sand and gravel deposit at Houndaller with processing plant newly erected next door, with another 8 million tonnes in reserves close by, then the relatively small amount of material from Straitgate – with its inherently high carbon footprint – is clearly not needed at all.
