Bradley Opencast Coal Mine Extension

Richard Buxton Solicitors represented local group Campaign to Protect the Pont Valley, preparing a detailed objection following the Council’s recommendation to grant planning permission for an open cast coal mine extension.  Planning permission was ultimately refused by Durham County Council’s Planning Committee, despite Council officers’ recommendation for approval.

The objection letter and the attached expert evidence, called into question the Council’s key assumptions about the coal mine’s climate impacts.  The letter warned the Council that, should the officer’s recommendation to approve be followed, it would violate the Environmental Impact Assessment regulations due to a failure to assess the carbon emissions from the use of the coal generated by the mine.  Similarly, there had also been a failure to assess emissions from the transport and distribution of associated fireclay to be produced.

The letter attached expert evidence from Professor Paul Ekins, the Director of the UCL Institute for Sustainable Resources, setting out why the Council’s remarkable assertion that the mine would be carbon-negative was “economic nonsense.”

The letter also addressed the Council officer’s advice that a key local policy (Policy M8) in relation to opencast mining was “out of date” under the terms of the National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF), setting out why the advice was incorrect.  Indeed, despite officers indicating that this policy was no longer consistent with national policy, the Council was simultaneously promoting a similar policy in its emerging local plan.  Properly considered, the policy was consistent with the NPPF and the assertion that the policy must be given very limited weight was wrong.  Policy M8 disfavoured “piecemeal working,” which officers admitted this was.

The letter concluded, that in the circumstances, a resolution by the Council to approve the application would be unlawful in the absence of significant further assessment of the potential climate impacts of the mine and a proper consideration of local policy.

Despite officer’s recommendation that permission be granted for the extension, Durham County Council’s Planning Committee decided to refuse permission for the mine extension on grounds including environmental impacts, residential amenity impacts, and conflict with Policy M8.