What the frack? West Pennine Moors

Mark 3 Comments

West Pennines-1Just in case any readers of this blog think that notification of SSSIs is mere paper-shifting that doesn’t mean anything on the ground have a look at this very helpful map of areas offered for fracking by the Oil and Gas Authority. The areas SD61 and SD62 on the West Pennine Moors have a bright green light as they do not contain notified sites.  The adjacent areas SD71 and SD72 are partly covered by SPA and SAC and SSSI designations/notifications (see MAGIC for details – not the easiest system to use, but worth the effort) and so are signalled as requiring appropriate assessment.

It is of no help to business and industry to delay notification of sites if the consequence is that they are misled into thinking that an area is open for development – whether it be wind farms, forestry, mineral extraction or supermarket development – when it should not be and when they will face fierce opposition from the nature conservation interest to protect sites.

The West Pennine Moors site qualifies as an SSSI – according to all who have spoken to me who have been told as much by NE staff – and was expected to have been notified early this year (after years of delay) but now seems to have been caught up in Natural England’s newly invented Gate Zero which appears to be a way of further delaying or excluding awkward sites from notification.

Natural England rarely objects to proposed developments these days and the task of protecting our natural heritage is passing from the statutory agencies and government itself to wildlife NGOs.  But only the statutory sector can designate and notify sites and in the case of the West Pennine Moors Defra and Natural England are falling down very badly on their responsibilities – their responsibilities to nature and to we taxpayers.

Is Natural England fit for purpose?

 

For more on the West Pennine Moors come back at 0830 today.

 

To find the history behind this post search for West Pennine Moors on this blog or have a look at these posts:

Natural England seem to have lost the West Pennine Moors, 2 April 2015

West Pennine Moors, 12 June 2015

West Pennine Moors again, 22 June 2015

Dear Natural England, 22 June 2015

Gate Zero and the West Pennine Moors, 21 September 2015

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3 Replies to “What the frack? West Pennine Moors”

  1. If i am reading it right at least part of SD55 is in the Forest of Bowland and is ‘Subject to Appropriate Assessment’ but it is an SSSI (Bowland Fells).

  2. Thanks Mark
    they have also classed areas in the Mendips that will put the World Heritage Site of the City of Bath at risk. This is home to the only hot spring in the whole of the UK, and this is one of the outstanding universal values of the WHS. The spring would qualify as a geological SSSI, but Natural England have told me they can’t work out where they would formally designate the site in order to protect the source, and supply of the hot spring.

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