Opponents fear desalination plant in St Austell Bay could harm the environment
Opponents say a desalination plant, which South West Water wants to build in St Austell Bay, Cornwall, will destroy marine life and damage the environment.
The company wants to build the plant - which will turn seawater into drinking water - at Par, to help boost water supplies in the Duchy.
John Elkington, a member of the desalination information group said:“I don’t think we’ve got to the bottom of what this will mean to the environment, everyone is very keen to tell me how important it is, but I don’t think they’ve been upfront on the evidence on what the environmental impact of desalination actually is.”
“What South West Water are doing is playing catch up, on all the years when insufficient work has been done to cope with the challenges that are ahead, and I don’t underestimate those, climate change is real and we’re going to get drier summers, but we will also get rain in the winter and we could be doing more to store it.”
The first phase of the plan will see a smaller plant in five shipping container sized units delivered and connected to existing infrastructure while further plans are developed for a much larger plant.
The company says by existing pipelines they will avoid any impact to the marine environment, including seagrass and maerl.
South West Water says the first phase will be capable of producing between 2.5 and 5 million litres of clean drinking water daily when needed.
David Harris, South West Water’s Drought and Resilience Director, said: “Desalination is one part of our wider £125 million investment plan to increase the water resources available in Cornwall by 45% and in Devon by 30% by 2025 to break the cycle of drought.
“Regulators are encouraging water companies to develop supplies that are resilient to the impacts of climate change, and desalination allows us to protect supplies across our region in the face of a changing climate in ways that more common interventions cannot.
“We share the passion that many locals have shown to protect the sensitive marine environment in St Austell Bay and this month’s events will provide us with an opportunity to continue demonstrating that we are doing everything we can to minimise any impact we have to marine habitats.”
Maureen was one of the visitors to an information event in Lostwithiel, her father worked at Par Docks for many years. She said: “There’s been so much negative talk about it from local people, I just wanted to find out for myself and find out why we need a desalination plant in view of the water that is pouring from the sky at the moment.”