Quarry extension approved by councillors

Elgan Hearn – Local democracy reporter

Plans to extend a quarry that has been deemed important for house building has been given the go ahead by councillors – but Welsh Government ministers could have the last say.

At a meeting of Blaenau Gwent County Borough Council’s Planning committee on Thursday, November 14 councillors an application for Gryphonn Quarries limited for Trefil Quarry near Tredegar.

The application was to extend the site by 22.2 hectares of which 20.9 hectares will be quarried.

Allowing the proposed extension area lies to the north of the existing quarry and would allow the extraction of a further 5.565 million tonnes of carboniferous limestone and also safeguard 17 jobs for several more years to come.

Objections

The proposals have been objected to by Bannau Brycheiniog (Brecon Beacons) National Park Authority (NPA) and environment body Natural Resources Wales (NRW).

The proposes site is currently open moorland and is only 800 metres from the park’s boundary and is within Mynydd Llangynidr SSSI (site of special scientific interest.)

At the start of the meeting councillors were told that the council had received some “late correspondence” from NRW on the application.

Committee chairwoman, Cllr Lisa Winnett asked if this would have an “impact” on the scheme in front of the councillors.

Regional mineral and waste planning manager, Hugh Towns: “No it won’t have an impact.”

Extension

He explained that NRW had said that a proposed extension to the SSSI was about to be signed off by a senior member of staff ahead of the planning meeting.

Mr Towns told the committee that efforts had been made to confirm the SSSI extension had been signed off but had received no response back from NRW.

Mr Towns said: “The impact of the SSSI is already covered in the report.”

He went on to explain the “exceptional circumstances” test would still apply.

This would be because there is no other way to meet the “clear need” of the building industry.

Mr Towns said: “I don’t believe the references from NRW change the report in any way.”

Mr Towns said: “The issue is one of balance: fundamentally if Blaenau Gwent is  going to meet its LDP growth aspirations for 3,500 dwellings and 50 hectares of land for employment, minerals are an essential requirement to meet that growth aspiration.

“Therefore, the need has to be given very significant weight.

He believed that some of the work done to restore the site following the quarry’s closure in the future would “compensate” for that biodiversity loss.

Application

Mr Towns said: “The recommendation is planning permission be granted.”

As a decision would be taken against NRW’s advice Mr Towns explained: “Welsh ministers need to be notified and given the opportunity to call in the application for their own determination”.

Cllr Winnett said: “We also had a site visit up there which was extremely informative and quite imperative I feel for us to understand the context and size of the development.”

Councillors went on to unanimously approve the application.