Villagers stage Oldbury anti-nuclear protest

Direct action by local res­i­dents against new E.On / RWE npow­er nuclear pow­er plant planned in Old­bury, Glouces­ter­shire.

Vil­lagers stage Old­bury anti-nuclear protest
August 4 2009

Vil­lagers liv­ing near the pos­si­ble site of a new nuclear pow­er sta­tion near Bris­tol staged a five-hour protest to pre­vent con­trac­tors get­ting on to the land.

Res­i­dents of Shep­per­dine, near Thorn­bury, blocked the access road to a field near the exist­ing Old­bury atom­ic plant until they were final­ly asked to move by police.

The site is one of a num­ber around the coun­try put for­ward by the Gov­ern­ment as a pos­si­ble loca­tion for one of the new gen­er­a­tion of nuclear sta­tions.

Pow­er firm Eon has acquired land at Shep­per­dine with anoth­er com­pa­ny RWE and wants to build a £4‑billion sta­tion.

The process involved in get­ting per­mis­sion will last for many years but as part of the ini­tial site devel­op­ment work, small-scale ground inves­ti­ga­tion and seis­mic stud­ies were due to have start­ed yes­ter­day morn­ing on the Shep­per­dine land to help deter­mine the type and best loca­tion for the foun­da­tions.

But when con­trac­tors from Almonds­bury firm Hydrock arrived with lor­ries, they found their way blocked by the pro­test­ers.

About 13 res­i­dents occu­pied the lane lead­ing to a field that has already been turned into a com­pound.

They said they had two con­cerns at this stage – whether per­mis­sion had been giv­en by the British Geo­log­i­cal Sur­vey (BGS) for the drilling to take place and whether South Glouces­ter­shire Coun­cil had giv­en the all-clear for the com­pound and park­ing area to be cre­at­ed.

Pro­test­er Reg Illing­worth said: “Ulti­mate­ly, we don’t want a new nuclear pow­er sta­tion here.

“But this protest is sole­ly about per­mis­sion for the pre­lim­i­nary work and the com­pound, which has already been built.

“We want to know if con­sent has been giv­en and if we see that in writ­ing, then we will stand aside.”

At one point, four police­men were at the scene but that was lat­er cut to two.

Act­ing sergeant Steve Wil­son said: “It’s a peace­ful protest and we are here to ensure it remains that way.”

There was also a debate through­out the morn­ing about whether the road being blocked was part of the pub­lic high­way or pri­vate­ly owned.

When it was con­firmed it was a pub­lic road, the res­i­dents moved aside and the Hydrock lor­ries went through.

Alan Pin­der, of South Glouces­ter­shire Friends of the Earth, was among the demon­stra­tors.

He said: “We want to ensure Eon is going through the prop­er process.

“You have to do every­thing by the book if you are going to run a nuclear pow­er sta­tion.”

Eon spokes­woman Emi­ly High­more said: “While we respect the right of peo­ple to protest, we would like to reas­sure every­one the ground inves­ti­ga­tion works and estab­lish­ment of a con­trac­tor’s com­pound have been car­ried out with the full knowl­edge of South Glouces­ter­shire Coun­cil and the BGS.

“It’s still very ear­ly days but we’re com­mit­ted to keep­ing every­one informed of our activ­i­ties and would urge any­one with any ques­tions or con­cerns to get in touch.”

BGS spokesman Clive Mitchell said the organ­i­sa­tion had to be noti­fied about drilling of holes deep­er than 30m for water abstrac­tion and min­er­al explo­ration but not site inves­ti­ga­tion.

South Glouces­ter­shire Coun­cil spokesman Ryan Skeets said: “The coun­cil was made aware of inten­tions by Eon to car­ry out some tem­po­rary ground inves­ti­ga­tion works that appear to be cov­ered by per­mit­ted devel­op­ment rights and there­fore would not require pri­or plan­ning per­mis­sion.

“The coun­cil will mon­i­tor these works to ensure they are being car­ried out in line with these inten­tions.”