PACT ANTI-OPENCAST

Sunday, 6 January 2008

The New Coal Age

By George Monbiot.
Published in the Guardian 9th October 2007.

A vast new opencast pit will ruin local people’s lives and wreck the government’s climate change policies. How was it allowed to happen?As I watched the machine scraping away the first buckets of soil, one thought kept clanging through my head. “If this is allowed to happen, we might as well give up now.

Read More at:-
www.monbiot.com

George Monbiot’s book
Heat: how to stop the planet burning is published with new material in paperback.
www.monbiot.com

Rigged

By George Monbiot.
Published in the Guardian 11th December 2007

Ladies and gentlemen, I have the answer! Incredible as it might seem, I have stumbled across the single technology which will save us from runaway climate change! From the goodness of my heart I offer it to you for free. No patents, no small print, no hidden clauses. Already this technology, a radical new kind of carbon capture and storage, is causing a stir among scientists. It is cheap, it is efficient and it can be deployed straight away. It is called … leaving fossil fuels in the ground.

www.monbiot.com

news!!!!

NEWS!!
PLANNING MEETINGS
Latest:-
Bridgend to meet on Thursday January 17th.
Neath /Port Talbot soon after that. Will keep you informed.

After the Public Meeting

In the Public Meeting that took place on the 13th November in Pyle on the proposed extension to Parc Slip/Margam opencast mine, the communities were treated with contempt and disregard with no direct answer being given to health, social or community concerns.The Planning officers constantly praised the company, for their ‘wonderful comprehensive environmental statement‘, for restoration and for pollution control, even though the communities present told them that in reality they know that restoration has been non existent for 13 years and believe monitoring to be inadequate. The thresholds are too high to protect the people from impacts.At the meeting people expressed their concerns that the opencast affects the physical, mental health and well- being of the local communities. It is already causing stress, worry and depression.PACT would also like to express our disapproval at how an Assembly Minister i.e. Mr Carwyn Jones, was treated by a Planning Officer from Neath/ Port Talbot CBC. The Officer’s attitude was one of arrogance and disregard for anything that the Assembly Minister had to say. Although not as outwardly obvious, the Bridgend officer seemed to us to be expressing his own opinions also rather than just answering questions.The presence of this opencast mine is not an asset to the physical environment or health and well being of our communities that are vulnerable and are already suffering from cumulative impacts. The people related real incidents of dust pollution, noise encroachment and asthma cases.The officer from Bridgend gave a poor response to the public’s health concerns. It is about time that the residents were listened to and the precautionary principle should apply.

No more open cast at Parc Slip

MANY readers have been following the story surrounding the application by Celtic Energy to extend the Parc Slip opencast site near Kenfig Hill and the opposition this has aroused in the local community. Here are my views on it.Eight or nine years ago now, an application was made to extend the site which led to permission being granted to opencast the present site. At that time, the community and BCBC were told this would be the last extension and that a drift mine would be sunk to win the coal in future years.But Celtic Energy no longer wants to do that and instead wants to extend the opencast site once again, despite the assurances given last time around.Understandably, the local community is unhappy as they feel they were promised that opencasting would end.I agree with them. I was one of the councillors who voted on the planning application last time and the fact that it was said there would be no more extensions was a strong factor in my choice of vote.In the past year, new planning guidance has emerged in Wales which makes it very difficult to obtain planning permission for opencast working where there is a settlement within 350 metres of the operational boundary of the opencast site. There are more than 100 houses within 350 metres of the proposed new extension, and there is a strong presumption against granting planning permission on those grounds alone.There are exceptions to the 350-metre buffer zone – for example, if there are safety issues that mean a site has to be opencasted to make it safe, or where land is being reclaimed for beneficial use through opencasting. It wouldn’t make sense if old tips had to be left that way when they could be reclaimed and the land used for housing and leisure uses. Neither of these factors applies at Parc Slip.A drift mine was promised, and despite the volatile nature of the market for coal it seems to me that is exactly what should happen, rather than opencasting again.
CARWYN JONES AM
Oct 4 2007Glamorgan Gazette
Thank You, Carwyn!

THE LOST YEARS

The revised Environmental Statement submitted by Celtic Energy concerning their Margam/Parc Slip Extension planning application would have us believe that extracting coal by opencast methods is no danger to health and well being, is sustainable and causes no lasting damage to the environment.If permission is granted, their prize would be our beautiful valley, Cwm Cynffig. The impossibility of reconstructing this beautiful landscape and its wildlife is one of the reasons why people are opposing opencast mining in our area. The company also have documented that anyone who opposes their developments are prejudiced. Our objections are born out of experience and knowledge and therefore cannot be ‘prejudice‘.Maybe the company should look up the word ’prejudice’. In the Oxford Dictionary the meaning is:-’ An adverse judgment or opinion formed beforehand or without knowledge or examination of the facts.--An unfavourable opinion or feeling formed beforehand or without knowledge, thought, or reason.’How can we then be prejudiced? We have the ‘knowledge’ and are more than familiar with the ‘facts’ having lived with this obscenity for decades. We have had plenty of time to form ‘opinions‘, to ‘think’ and to finally ‘reason’ that we want no more opencast in our area. That is not prejudice!!In the Environmental Statement, Celtic Energy show colourful Disneyland computer generated images of wonderful landscape features, such as broad leaf woodlands and hedgerows. These will take so long to mature that, although our children’s, children’s, children may be lucky enough to see them, we certainly will not!If Celtic Energy are truly interested in what the people want, they should show us their wonderful ability to restore now. They can attempt to beautify the present moonscape site that has been destroyed, (with no restoration for 13 years,) and do there all that they propose to do in the new application !!.Opencast has been in our area since the 1940’s.Since the ‘90’s the people of Cefn Cribbwr and Aberbaiden, perched above the site, and living with the impacts of noise, dust, diesel fumes and depressing visual aspect every day, have had their quality of life ruined . The added impact of severed roads and countryside access has added to the misery. That can never be restored .No amount of restoration can ever replace the lost years for the people of our communities!

Opencast Objection

Press Release: 25/06/2007

Opencast extension plans opposed by Aberavon AM and MP

Aberavon’s political representatives Dr Brian Gibbons AM and Dr Hywel Francis MP have today written a joint letter to the local authority opposing Celtic Energy’s plans to extend the Margam Opencast site. Dr Francis said; “Both our offices have received numerous representations from constituents affected by the proposals objecting to these plans. “Having studied these objections we feel that there is a strong case for rejecting these plans on a number of grounds and we have written to the planning authority to formally oppose the proposed extension to the site”. Dr Gibbons said; “It is our understanding that the proposals potentially bring the site to within 350 metres of some dwellings which is the absolute minimum distance a site should be away from communities as set out by the draft coal TAN. We feel that the advice set out in the TAN should be adhered to as minimal good practice. Dr Francis said: “The communities affected by this application have had to live with the effects of the site for many decades and this has undoubtedly resulted in an adverse effect on people's wellbeing. It has also brought about a loss of amenity with many local access routes being closed as a result of this site. The proposed extension would only see this situation deteriorate further. “The representations we have received have pointed out that promises made by the developers during the last planning application have for the most part been unmet and as a result we have little confidence in them fulfilling any promises they may have made in relation to the current application with regard to restoration of the site”.Dr Gibbons said; “The proposals also have the effect of cutting further into the remaining green wedge which will cause further ecological damage to area that has already been subjected to the scarring of opencasting for many years. “The proposals before the planning authority represent a totally unacceptable green wedge development that will have a significant negative health, ecological and social impact on all the communities affected and as a result we have formally opposed the application”.

OUR STORY

We’ve had opencast mining in our community for almost 60 years. The most recent work started six years ago. In spring 2005, an application to extend the site by 51 hectares to the west was put forward by the mining company, Celtic Energy Ltd. This would have been through parts of ancient woodland and could have had an effect on biodiversity.The existing mine looks absolutely horrific. It’s a huge, black hole which looks like a moonscape. The mine is in the valley so you can see it from all directions - from the motorway to the sand dunes.It is also really close to the community. This means the noise and dust created can have a big impact, which makes our area a unique case.Strong public feeling
When Celtic Energy submitted the application there was a meeting in Bridgend. The public were allowed to attend but not to comment. That’s where I met other residents who were against the plan and together we set up PACT – Protecting and Conserving Together.The strength of public feeling against the mine is incredible. Now hundreds of people are involved, but it’s still down to a few of us to do all the organising. Unhealthy situationPACT approached the Cardiff Institute of Society of Health and Ethics to carry out a health impact assessment of the proposed extension on people living in the area. Their research came to the conclusion that the negative aspects of expansion would outweigh the positive. The report said; “The loss of amenity, visual impact, nuisance dust, noise and pollution are strong arguments against further open casting close to this community.”But health is not an issue that has to be taken into account in planning at the moment. This needs to change because, the way things are, councils can just pick and choose what they want to take out of something like a health impact assessment.
I don’t think there is a balance between industry and the needs of the people. Legislation on dust and noise is all geared up to help the industry. This means it doesn’t matter how much residents complain, because whenever noise or dust levels are measured they seem to be deemed OK. That’s why we’re calling for tighter legislation.Last month Celtic Energy withdrew their expansion plans. But we weren’t celebrating because that’s not the end of it. They have also put in an application for a time extension of another year for the existing site. No time extension has ever been refused.