Appendix A Borough of Broxbourne Original consultation response You may be aware that this Council considered a report in respect of the above planning application at the meeting of the Planning and Regulatory Committee on 18 th April, 2017. A copy of that report is enclosed. Its recommendations were unanimously supported by the members of the committee. This report is in advance of the full and formal consideration of the planning application by the same committee which will take place in advance of the County’s determination. I would be grateful if you could keep me informed of the likely timing of that. I would also still welcome your attendance at this Council’s Planning and Regulatory committee meeting in due course. You will note from the report and recommendations that this Council has undertaken a preliminary assessment of the planning application against the key policies within the Development Plan. It is my strongly considered view that this application is contrary to the key determining policies of the Development Plan and that it is therefore contrary to the Development Plan as a whole. I would be very concerned if the County Council did not reach a similar conclusion as the starting point for determining whether or not there are sufficient material circumstances to justify approving this application contrary to the provisions of the Development Plan. I am also extremely concerned by the process that has been followed by Veolia and the County Council as waste disposal authority to promote the largest waste facility in the history of Hertfordshire on a site that is contrary to the provisions of the Development Plan. This also raises serious questions about the respective roles of the County Council as waste disposal authority and waste planning authority and the apparent lack of empathy between those roles. For the above reasons, and following initial assessment of the other material planning considerations, I have recommended to the Council that it should at this stage indicate to the County Council an objection in principle to the planning application. The Council has agreed with that recommendation and I would be grateful if you could treat this letter as forming the first part of this Council’s objection to the planning application. I would also recommend that you address all of the matters raised within my report within your own detailed consideration. In particular, I would ask that you and your colleagues reflect on the matters relating to the Development Plan and the question of due process. It may be the case that having reflected on these and other matters relating to this highly controversial planning application, the County Council considers that determination would benefit from the Secretary of State’s intervention through immediate referral/call in, and possibly public inquiry. This would ensure a full, open and independent assessment of the material planning issues, free of any allegations and possible actions that could follow any resolution to approve the application by the County Council. Broxbourne Council would therefore invite Hertfordshire County Council to jointly 1 recommend such an approach to the Secretary of State. I would be grateful if you could respond to this request by Friday 5 th May. Notwithstanding the foregoing, there are a number of outstanding issues on which we have previously corresponded. I am going to respond to your helpful response of 1 st March to my questions and apologise for not having done so before now. Once I have done so, it may be helpful for us to meet with Veolia and your waste colleagues so that there is a full and common understanding of the way forward on those issues. One issue that I would like to raise in this letter is a previous request that I had made for the County Council/Veolia to make use of the Paramics traffic model produced for the development of c. 500 houses at High Leigh to the west of Hoddesdon. This would graphically demonstrate to the decision makers the true impact of the additional vehicle trips to the ERF. It does need to be brought up to date with the most recent trip analyses but that should be relatively straightforward. Perhaps you could discuss this with your highways colleagues and respond to me. Report to the Planning and Regulatory Committee dated 18 th April, 2017 RECOMMENDED that: (a) the principle that the Council will object to the planning application is agreed; (b) Hertfordshire County Council be advised that a formal objection will be submitted in due course; and (c) a report on the detailed reasons for objection be brought to the Committee later in the year. Purpose To advise the Committee of the main issues related to the proposed Veolia Energy Recovery Facility at Ratty’s Lane, Hoddesdon and to seek members’ preliminary views on the development. Introduction Veolia ES (Hertfordshire) Ltd has submitted a planning application for a waste burning Energy Recovery Facility (ERF) on a site at the end of Ratty’s Lane within Hoddesdon Business Park. The site is currently used as an aggregates depot. The ERF will annually burn up to 350,000 tonnes of waste and generate 33.5 megawatts of power. Most of the waste will be municipal, delivered through a contract between Hertfordshire County Council and Veolia to manage the county’s municipal waste. The municipal waste stream will also be supplemented by commercial and industrial waste from a wider catchment. The planning application has been submitted to Hertfordshire County Council as the waste planning authority. The Borough has been consulted on the application and will be making a written response. The content of that response will be agreed by this Committee. Requests have been submitted to the Secretary of State to call in this planning application, including from Charles Walker OBE MP. It may also be the view of this 2 Council that the application should be called in. It is considered that this decision should be made when this Committee formally considers its position on the planning application. The County Council has indicated that it is unlikely to consider the application until late Summer/early Autumn. This being the case, it is considered that this Council should delay its formal consideration until closer to the point of determination. This will enable officers to undertake further dialogue on certain outstanding issues with the County Council. When the application is formally presented to this Committee, it will be through the usual format of reporting planning applications. This will enable members to fully consider the planning issues in making a detailed response to the County Council and in possibly seeking call in of the application. The Development Whilst the full application site is 5 hectares, this includes Ratty’s Lane and rail sidings. The effective site development area for the ERF is c. 2.5 hectares. The relative limitations of the site have required a tall and utilitarian box like design as indicated below. This covers a built footprint of 8,250 square metres. The contents of this structure would include a tipping hall, an incineration chamber, a boiler hall, various treatment facilities, an administration building and a visitor centre. The main building would be 48 metres in height (the adjacent Rye House Power Station is 28 metres). There will be two chimneys of 87 metres in height (the adjacent power station chimneys are 58 metres). Outside the main building will be a circulation area for waste vehicles, parking, a large storage shed alongside the railway for incineration bottom ash and flood water storage areas, as indicated below. Waste collected by Broxbourne, East Herts and Welwyn Hatfield is planned to be delivered straight from domestic rounds. The remaining Hertfordshire authorities’ collected mixed refuse would be bulked at Waste Transfer Stations at Waterdale (Watford) and a more northerly location prior to delivery to Ratty’s Lane. Waste would also be collected at the Household Waste Recycling Centres at Hoddesdon, Turnford, Buntingford, Bishops Stortford, Ware and Cole Green. In total, approximately 76.7% of the waste received at the site is anticipated to be domestic waste generated within the County. In addition, commercial/industrial/medical waste would be brought in from Hertfordshire and beyond. Most, but not necessarily all, waste will be delivered to the site from the A10, along the Dinant Link Road, along Essex Road and into the site through Ratty’s Lane. Ratty’s Lane is a narrow, dead end road through which for much of its length waste vehicles will not be able to pass. A traffic light system is therefore proposed. Officers are seeking further clarification on the operation of this system. HGV waste vehicle movements are proposed to be 134 vehicles in and 134 vehicles out daily. Planning History 3 The established use of the application site is as an aggregates depot which is operated by Tarmac. Veolia had previously submitted a Development Consent Order application to the Planning Inspectorate in 2012 for the construction of a Power Station on the Ratty’s Lane site – then described as Fielde’s Lock. Broxbourne Council was identified by Veolia as the responsible local planning authority. The Power Station was to be fuelled by solid recovered fuel and natural gas. The application was in support of Veolia’s tender to manage waste from the North London Waste Partnership. Waste was to be delivered to the site by rail. That application was withdrawn before its determination. The current application is very similar in its make-up but does not include natural gas and it is understood that waste will not be in a ‘solid recovered’ form. The development is not therefore described as a power station.