Concerns about road safety and the loss of prime agricultural land have been raised over two proposed biomass plants for Moray.
Acorn Bioenergy has submitted initial plans for anaerobic digestion plants at Longmorn near Elgin and Rathven close to Buckie.
They are designed to convert waste feed stock into biogas. That is then upgraded to methane to be fed on to the national grid.
Councillors were asked to give feedback on both proposal of application notices at a meeting on Tuesday.
Councillor Derek Ross told members of the planning committee he went to public meetings in relation to the Longmorn proposal.
‘Feisty debates’ over biomass plants near Elgin and Buckie
He said: “They were both very well attended and had feisty debates between the developer and local people, significantly local farmers.
“The main concerns are loss of prime agricultural land, the large footprint of the development and access to the A941.
“Also residents feel they’re moving from a generally rural landscape to an industrialised one.”
Issues were raised over lorries and tractors stacking up on a fast stretch of the Elgin to Rothes road, particularly at harvest time.
Loss of farmland
Mr Ross said: “Some people from Rothes were concerned this development would mean more lorry movements through a village that is already stressed.”
He added representatives of the National Farmers Union questioned whether potale, draff and straw were not waste products but used by local farmers for their livestock.
Councillor Donald Gatt said speeding was a “fairly regular occurrence” on that part of the road and raised issue with the development being sited on agricultural fields.
He said: “There seems to be a few applications recently that are taking up a substantial amount of farmland.”
Councillor Draeyk Van Der Horn wanted clarification on what defined waste feed.
He said: “I used to be a farmer in a different life, and there’s no such thing as waste. This is all useful material.”
Mr Van Der Horn also asked for figures on how many tonnes of waste product would be needed to create 100GW of power.
Councillor Marc Macrae said one Longmorn resident had recently reported three separate road traffic incidents to the emergency services.
Useful material
He added that the A98 road past where the Buckie plant is proposed is like the “Indianapolis speedway”.
Mr Macrae said: “Between these two we’re looking at over 16 hectares of land being taken away.
“We do seem to be losing an incredible amount of agricultural land.”
There were also calls for protection of a historic cairn near Buckie.
Information from councillors will be given to the company in preparation for full planning applications to be submitted.
Each plant will have a generating capacity of 100GW a year.
Neither development will be connected to the grid directly.
Methane is expected to be transported to the company’s off-site hub near Inverness Airport where it will enter the network.
The Longmorn site is 10.2 hectares, with the A941 road to the east and Ben Romach Distillery to the South.
At Buckie the plant is proposed for a six hectare site around 300 meters south of the town, to the east of the junction with March Road and the A98.
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