A £6.5 million eco-school will be built in Darlington after planners gave the project the go-ahead yesterday.

North Road Primary School on St Paul's Terrace will be demolished and rebuilt on its present site by September 2009.

Darlington Borough Council's planning committee was unanimous in its support for the plans.

The new building will accommodate 420 pupils and feature a raft of environmentally-friendly techniques.

The school will have a sedum roof, made from a living plant which provides superior insulation.

The building's power will come from a bio-mass burner which uses locally sourced wood chips as fuel.

Other features include the harvesting of rain water for use in toilets and landscaping, and the school will be positioned to utilise the natural light and the heat of the sun to minimise utility bills.

Councillor Stella Robson of Darlington Borough Council's planning committee said the project could prove to be a blueprint for other large-scale developments in Darlington.

Coun Robson, who is also chair of the council's economy and environment scrutiny committee, added: "I'm delighted that so much trouble has been gone to accommodate the climate change issues we have examined.

"This is a template that planning can take into account when looking at other big developments."

Two mini-football pitches will be built on the site of the existing school building, and boundary fencing will fringe part of the grounds.

But Gordon Pybus of Darlington Association on Disability raised concerns over the access to the site for disabled parents and those wishing to pass through.

As the grounds will be made secure during school hours, with no-one allowed to pass through, a path will divert pedestrians around the perimeter of the site.

Mr Pybus said: "We have absolutely nothing against the school, but we still believe that a proper controlled pathway should be able to run through from North to South from Pendleton Road.

"It is far too far for many disabled people to go around.

"It could be a danger at night."

The council's planning officer Dave Coates said: "This decision was very much driven by the brief to provide a secure site that people couldn't walk through during school hours."