Plans for an electricity substation covering 200 acres of farmland on the border with Dundee have drawn the largest volume of objections ever submitted to Angus Council.
SSEN lodged the Balkemback application with the council last November.
It would see the creation of a substation platform the size of nearly 30 football pitches on a site totalling almost 80 hectares.
The development would sit at the southern end of a line of planned ‘super-pylons’ SSEN wants to run up from Aberdeenshire to Angus.
The Scottish Government will decide on the 400kV line scheme.
But it is Angus Council which will determine the substation application.
SSEN says it hopes for a “timely determination” on the application
Campaigners’ 28-page submission against Tealing plan
And planning officials are now working their way through a mountain of documents which includes around 1,700 individual objections to the scheme.
It is the largest response to a planning application in the council’s history.
Hundreds of people have submitted a pro forma objection highlighting issues including landscape impact.
It also raises concerns over property devaluation and cumulative damage across the region from the Tealing proposal and other developments such as solar farms and battery energy storage sites.
Objectors also claim the site selection process has been flawed and lacked transparency.
There is also a 28-page joint submission from Stop Tealing Industrialisation Group (STIG) and Angus Pylon Action Group (APAG).
It highlights other known energy developments totalling 3,200MW of capacity and covering more than 350 acres in Angus.
“Whilst the Scottish Government has set ambitious targets for renewable energy capacity on and offshore in Scotland, the track record shows that these will not be achieved,” the objection concludes.
It says SSEN has not set out a case for the scheme and suggests there is no wider justification for it.
The most recent comment on the proposal has come from the Ministry of Defence.
The MoD said the Tealing site sits outwith safeguarded defence sites such as aerodromes or weapons ranges and therefore it has no objection to the application.
Neighbouring Dundee City Council’s only comment on the application related to passing bays for construction traffic on Emmock Road.
Angus community councils including Tealing, Strathmartine, Forfar, Kirriemuir and Inveresk shave submitted objections.
What happens next with the Tealing application?
Angus Council had set an internal target date of March 24 to deal with the application.
A determination deadline passed on April 1.
However, the council’s planning portal indicates an agreed expiry date of June 30.
It is the authority’s development standards committee which will decide the outcome of the SSEN scheme.
The committee is scheduled to meet three times between now and June 10.
But it will then be August 12 before it convenes after the summer recess.
Site chosen following ‘extensive’ work
An SSEN spokesperson said: “The proposed Emmock substation site was identified following an extensive site selection exercise, which included seeking and considering feedback from the community and other stakeholders while balancing technical and environmental considerations.
“Community feedback has helped shape the substation design, reducing the platform level and orientating features to reduce visibility.
“The substation is a key part of our plans to upgrade the electricity network in the north of Scotland in support of national clean power and energy security ambitions – we are working with Angus Council as part of the planning process, as we seek the timely determination of our application.”
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