The Town and Country Planning (Environmental Impact Assessment) Regulations 2017 say Environmental Statements should include:
A description of the reasonable alternatives (for example in terms of development design, technology, location, size and scale) studied by the developer, which are relevant to the proposed project and its specific characteristics, and an indication of the main reasons for selecting the chosen option, including a comparison of the environmental effects.
It’s something to look out for when Aggregate Industries finally gets around to submitting revised and long-awaited documents to support its application to quarry Straitgate Farm, to check that all reasonable alternatives have been addressed – including but not limited to the do-nothing option, site access, phasing, processing location, mode of transport.
Well ok, no one is suggesting Aggregate Industries employ Straitgate's cows to haul sand.
Aggregate Industries did look at alternatives for its first application in 2015. When previously arguing the case for processing Straitgate's material on Woodbury Common in the East Devon AONB, the company claimed:
Processing at Hillhead may be feasible, but would generate a massively greater quantity of CO2 from the additional mileage required to be travelled. 8.48
What is now proposed? Processing at Hillhead. The cost: a haulage scheme of 2.5 million miles.
According to the above regulations, Environmental Statements should include:
A description of the likely significant effects of the development on the environment resulting from, inter alia:... (f) the impact of the project on climate (for example the nature and magnitude of greenhouse gas emissions)
In 2019, Devon County Council, which has declared its own climate emergency, advised Aggregate Industries – "in the spirit of helping to address issues" – to contact experts at Exeter University to help it explain away, to greenwash?, the "massively greater quantity of CO2 from the additional mileage". What a sympathetic council.
