The health boards of Tayside and Fife are calling for stringent environmental controls on the Dundee biomass plant.
In a joint response to the Scottish Government, NHS Tayside and NHS Fife express no view on whether they support or oppose the contentious £325 million proposal for the city’s harbour but do have concerns about its impact on public health.
They are not statutory consultees in the Scottish Government’s process to decide if Forth Energy’s woodfuel power station project should be granted permission under the Electricity Act.
Their 13-page document, signed by Dr Drew Walker, director of public health for NHS Tayside, and Dr Jackie Hyland, honorary consultant in public health for NHS Fife, makes four key recommendations.
These are that Scottish ministers require the applicants, prior to approving the application, to:
* Give an assurance that the development will incorporate best available techniques to minimise emission of air pollutants so that they fall significantly below the maximum permissible;
* Review and upgrade threshold levels on a three-yearly basis to ensure compliance with an increasing body of evidence that air pollution below the legislative limits has a negative impact on the health of the more vulnerable;
* Scottish ministers should formally request Forth Energy to provide higher levels of guarantee that the use of heat from the plant in a local heat network will be at or near capacity from the outset perhaps in the form of binding contracts so that there can be much more confidence about the efficient use of energy from the incineration;
* Make it a condition of approval that Forth Energy convene, maintain and conduct an ongoing community liaison group during the construction, operation and decommissioning of the biomass plant as a forum for monitoring health, environmental or social concerns or any issue that might arise. The group should comprise the public, public health, the city council, the Scottish Environment Protection Agency and other relevant stakeholders.
The response, written by NHS Tayside and countersigned by its southern neighbour, covers concerns it expressed when the controversial proposal was first raised three years ago.