Representation by Ellen Strachan
- Date submitted
- 5 June 2024
- Submitted by
- Members of the public/businesses
The land where it is proposed that the carbon capture facility should go is not a suitable site. It is part of Crossness Nature Reserve that Thames Water have a legal responsibility to protect until 2093. The site was given legal protection as mitigation when Thames Water built its sewage sludge incinerator. This area of land is one of the last remaining areas of grazing marsh in the Thames Estuary and as such is irreplaceable. It provides a habitat to water voles which are classified as endangered on the Great Britain and England Red list for mammals as well as being protected in the UK under the Wildlife and Countryside Act, 1981 and recognised as a priority Species under the UK Post-2010 Biodiversity Framework. It is also home to the shrill carder bee, a very scarce bumblebee found in only a few isolated populations in the UK. The shrill carder bee is a biodiversity action plan (BAP) species. The area of land offered as mitigation for building the carbon capture plant- the old golf course- is already valuable habitat for wildlife that co-exists with the Crossness Nature Reserve. As it is already of importance to wildlife, it can not replace an area of nature reserve that is to be lost- overall there is a decrease in habitat for wildlife. It is also not grazing marshland so even if it wasn't double counting, it is not replacing like with like. It also doesn't compensate for a ditch used by watervoles that there is plans to build on. The proposed mitigation land is also already designated as an area to mitigate for Tilfen Land’s (now Peabody) development on the Veridion Business Park. It is proposed that the area of mitigation land will have protected status but what value does protected status have when the area of land that is going to be built on already has protected status and is a Local Nature Reserve (LNR), a Metropolitan Site of Importance for Nature Conservation (MSINC) and Metropolitan Open Land (MOL) demonstrating significant value for the whole of London? I am pleased that Cory wish to build a carbon capture plant as we are facing a climate crisis, but this is not the place to do it and an alternative site of less importance to wildlife should be used instead. Grazing marshland is also an important store for carbon dioxide and degradation of this habitat could also result in release of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.