A CONTROVERSIAL planning application to create a wind farm alongside Hinkley Point power station has been delayed again, with a decision now unlikely to be taken much before the end of the year. It is the third lengthy delay to hit the application by Your Energy, which wants to site up to a dozen turbines, each around 116 metres tall, in a field alongside the nuclear power station. The plans were originally scheduled to be decided by West Somerset District Council's planning committee in June last year, that was pushed back until March, and now a further delay means the application will not be decided until "autumn or winter 2005". A spokesman for the district council said the hold- ups had been due to the length of time taken to obtain additional information and for those details to then be assessed by a range of statutory consultees. He said the Ministry of Defence had asked for the most westerly of the proposed turbines to be moved away from a safety exclusion zone around the power station, while the Health and Safety Executive was concerned about the impact of "blade throw" - a term used to describe what happens when a blade breaks or shatters. The spokesman said the council's own consultants Nicholas Pearson Associates had now finished their own appraisal of Your Energy's environmental assessment, which meant the company could finally have a full written list of all the issues which needed to be addressed. "It will be for Your Energy to respond and take the steps they feel necessary, including any revision of the application," he said. "Assuming a revised submission is received, the council will then engage in a full round of public consultation." A month will be allowed for all "interested parties" to consider the revisions to the plans before the application finally goes before the planning committee - more than a year after the plans were first lodged with the authority.
