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| AMEC Submits Planning Application for Ray Wind Farm A planning application for the Ray wind farm has been submitted to the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry by AMEC’s wind energy business. The submission signals the beginning of the formal consultation process and follows a series of public exhibitions held in September. The proposed wind farm will consist of a maximum of 20 wind turbines on Ray Estate, near Kirkwhelpington, Northumberland. With an anticipated installed capacity of 60MW the wind farm could provide an amount of green electricity equivalent to that required to satisfy the domestic needs of around 33, 500 households. This equates to approximately 25% of Northumberland’s population. AMEC’s wind energy business, based in Hexham, started to investigate the Ray Estate site in the early 1990’s. The site has been designed to minimise impact on the local landscape, complies with regional and local planning policy guidance for renewable energy development and is sited outside of any nationally designated areas. AMEC has incorporated the information gained from environmental studies within the design of the proposed wind farm. Some of these features include: · Floating roads that will be used for the majority of site access roads to minimise impacts on local ecology, hydrology and archaeology. (A ‘floating road’, where the road is constructed on top of a geotextile surface laid directly on to the peat, rather than being excavated, is generally only built where peat depths exceed approximately 1 m.) · Avoidance of sensitive bird nesting areas. · A Habitat Management Plan that will be implemented which will include measures to restore and enhance moorland habitats to the north of the site. · Avoidance of known archaeology to ensure that there is no direct impact. write your comments about the article :: © 2005 Construction News :: home page |