THE North-East looks certain to have another major tourist attraction after councillors yesterday passed plans for an energy village on a remote dales site.
The development would reverse years of economic decline and create Britain’s first truly sustainable community in Weardale, County Durham, supporters told a meeting in Durham City.
Artists impression of Eastgate renewable energy village. Click on image to enlarge
Seven years after Lafarge Cement closed its plant at Eastgate, Durham County Council’s strategic planning committee voted unanimously in favour of the Weardale Task Force scheme.
Force chairman John Hamilton described the village, which will eventually create 350 jobs, as “a once-ina- lifetime chance to provide a valuable legacy for the next generation”.
Dubbed the Bath of the North because of its public hot springs spa, it will be unique in demonstrating all five forms of renewable energy – geothermal, wind, solar, hydro and biomass – which will heat and light homes and businesses on the site and in the rest of Weardale.
Planned for the largely privately- financed village are 65 houses, more than 8,000sq metres of business floor space, nine live/work units, visitor and education centres, a 60 bed hotel, shops, cafes and a new terminus for the Weardale Railway.
Outside the main complex, the emphasis is on the landscape, nature conservation, education and countryside awareness with mountain biking, rural crafts, tobogganing, a rock park and a wood-burning narrow gauge railway.
Connected by a cable car to the “Tops” quarry area will be leisure facilities, viewing platforms and a bird watching centre.
Mr Hamilton said the village would contribute to the economic growth of the whole North-East region.
He said: “Eastgate eco-village is an inspiring story. It is a real Phoenix project creating new life out of the ashes of industrial decay and decline.”
Weardale businessman Bill Hobson said: “Three of my main customers have closed.
School numbers have fallen and people commute out of the dale or have left over the past seven or eight years.
“We need some development to keep Weardale as a working dale.”
Councillor Keith Davidson said: “This is the biggest and one of the most exciting schemes I have seen in 20 years.”
An action group of Eastgate residents supported by Stanhope Parish Council and The Weardale Society, opposed the development, speaking of their fears over contamination at the Lafarge site, of roads gridlocked by tourist traffic and the impact on the landscape.
Dr Irving Spurr, who lives near the site, questioned its sustainability, in particular the wisdom of importing tens of thousands of tons of woodchip to burn in the biomass plant, the main energy source. He said: “It massively contravenes well-established national, regional, sub-regional and local policies.”
Building work could start at Eastgate in 2011, provided it is not delayed by being “called in” for Government scrutiny.
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