Case studies of EIA in practice - Introduction to Environmental Impact Assessment - page 254

at the time and therefore did not feature in the consent
process for the power station. Following considerable
public uproar over the proposed power lines, in April 1991
the Council for the Protection of Rural England (CPRE)
lodged a formal complaint with…the European
Commission in Brussels against the UK Secretary of State
for Energy. (Sheate 1995)
This state of affairs could hardly be regarded as an example of good EIA practice, but
how did it come to occur?
The complaint concerned the EIA for a large new gas-fired power station at Wilton,
near Middlesbrough on Teesside, proposed by a consortium known as Teesside Power
Limited. CPRE argued that consent had been granted for the power station without the
full environmental impacts of the proposal having been considered. Because of its size (a
generating capacity of 1875 MW), the power station was an Annex I project and EIA was
therefore mandatory. However, the overall “project” consisted of a number of linked
components, in addition to the power station itself. These included:
• a new natural-gas pipeline;
• a gas reception and processing facility;
• a combined heat and power (CHP) fuel pipeline from the processing facility to the CHP
facility; and
• new 400 kv overhead transmission lines and system upgrades (75-85 km in length,
running from the power station site to Shipton, near York).
It was the implications of the transmission connections required to service the new power
station that were of particular concern, although the other project components also had
the potential for environmental impacts. Cleveland CC, in whose area the power station
was located, expressed the view that a full assessment of the implications of all project
components should be undertaken before the consent decision on the power station was
taken. The County Planning Officer commented:
My council wanted the power station [consent decision] deferred until all
the implications could be fully considered. But the Secretary of State [for
Energy—the consenting authority for schemes of this type at the time]
wasn't prepared to do this. The result is that different features of the
scheme, which includes pipelines and a gas cleaning plant as well as the
main station and its transmission lines, come up at different stages with
different approval procedures. An overall view hasn't been possible.
Despite these concerns, consent for the power station was granted by the Secretary of
State for Energy in November 1990. The consent decision was based on the information
contained in the environmental statement for the power station, and without the benefit of
a public inquiry. However, crucially the power station ES did not include a description or
assessment of the effects of the other elements of the overall “project”, including the
pipelines, gas processing facility and transmission lines. These elements of the project