Anger at 'revised' turbine proposal

Apr 15 2009 by Brian Daniel, The Journal

A COMPANY seeking to build a wind farm in Northumberland was last night accused of attempting to mislead and deceive opponents.

Your Energy wants planning permission to put seven 110m turbines at Moorsyde, near Berwick.

The firm’s bid was rejected by Berwick Borough Council last March and it then appealed, triggering a public inquiry which is due to take place next month.

Now however, the company has come under fire from opponents of its scheme, over photomontages pieced together to show how its turbines would appear in the landscape. Your Energy produced montages when the Moorsyde application was lodged in November 2006, and these were considered by the council’s officers when recommending the scheme be approved.

It has now come up with new images just weeks before the inquiry. And objectors say these pictures have the turbines appearing much bigger than in the original images, and in some cases totally different locations.

The Journal understands Northumberland County Council, which has assumed the borough council’s role in the inquiry process following local government reorganisation, is not happy at the changes and has written to the planning inspectorate.

The Moorsyde Action Group claims the new montages show the developer had previously “grossly misrepresented” the size of the turbines, and show some of the structures “hundreds of metres” from their locations in the old drawings.