It’s not often there are security guards on the door and hundreds queuing to get into a local council planning meeting – but such is the strength of feeling here in North Devon, that was exactly the case this week.
After months of campaigns, site visits, ecological and economical reports, North Devon Council was set to vote on a hugely controversial plan to run major electrical cables from a new offshore wind farm to Saunton Sands and under the dunes around it.
A UNESCO biosphere and one of the UK’s top tourist beaches, there has been no shortage of local opposition – 1,843 objections to be precise.
“Essentially, we’re not against the wind farm. We are pro-renewables as a group,” says Helen Cooper, the head of Save Our Sands, which is against the proposal.
“Our concern is that it seems like they’ve probably just put a pin in a map and gone, oh, that’s a nice long sandy beach, let’s land there.”
Fellow campaigner Liz Seymour says the area is a “hotspot” for nature – from lizards to snakes.
“Most people come to North Devon for the value of the nature here. It’s world class by nature.
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“It’s illogical to tarnish an area that’s pristine and an UNESCO biosphere for the sake of one cable bringing in 100 megawatts,” she adds.
Local hotels, holiday lets and beach shops are all concerned about the building impact that’ll last several years.
The developers, White Cross, say the project will power 135,000 homes and that they’ve adapted plans to minimise environmental and social impacts.
‘Scar through the landscape’
What’s happening in this corner of Devon reflects a challenge being felt in other parts of the UK too; balancing the need for cleaner energy with the impact of building the infrastructure required to deliver it.
Sixty miles across the Bristol Channel in Mid Wales, there’s another group mounting a legal fight.
Around 300 farmers and landowners from Builth Wells down to Carmarthen have been fighting plans for 60 miles of electricity pylons, bringing clean energy from new onshore wind farms.
Some have ended up in court in recent weeks after refusing access to the developers Green GEN Cymru.
Dyfan Walters is from the Llandovery Pylon Community Action Group. We join him on his farm, as he points out where the two planned pylons will go.
“It would have a massive impact on the landscape. These oak trees you see behind us, hundreds of those trees on the route of the pylon line, they would have to be felled. It would cut a sort of scar through the landscape really,” he said.
He, and many landowners, want the cables to be ploughed underground instead.
“These cables could have been installed by now to be honest. If they’d worked with us two years ago when we offered, every farm down this valley would have opened up and the cables would have been in place,” he said.
Doing that is too expensive, according to developers.
Green GEN Cymru told Sky News it will always look to “reduce the visual impact of our projects where possible” – but that “fully undergrounding routes is not economically viable”.
Locals’ anger
Back in North Devon, there’s been nearly six hours of heated debate – for and against.
There have been boos and cheers; not every local is against it – some want the area to lead the way in clean energy amid a climate crisis.
But the majority here are angry that going green is coming at the cost of harming the very environment it is meant to protect.
A vote is taken: Ten for, two against, one abstention. Planning for the cable is approved.
An air of disappointment hangs inside Barnstable Rugby Club. I catch up with Helen.
“I take some comfort in the fact it wasn’t unanimous – it was a very heated debate,” she said.
“We’ll re-group, we’ll have a look, we believe we’ve got good grounds for a legal challenge on this.”
Her group has raised £10,000 and hopes to continue the fight.
A spokesperson for the Department for Energy and Net Zero told Sky News that securing Britain’s clean energy future “will require improving infrastructure in a cost-effective way” to get renewable electricity on the grid.
It added that without this infrastructure, “we will leave families exposed to volatile fossil fuel markets and energy price spikes”.
But whether it’s pylons, solar, wind farms – the government’s push for infrastructure to go green is causing friction on the local frontline.
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Standing on the dunes overlooking Saunton Sands, Helen believes ripping up this environment isn’t the answer.
“This is being so undervalued. The developers want to go through irreplaceable habitat. Just think about that. It’s irreplaceable habitat,” she said.
“We are damaging a really precious environment, for the sake of the environment – how does that make any sense?”
