Area devastated by reservoir plan

A MULIT-BILLION pound infrastructure project to build a reservoir on land near Sleaford in South Lincolnshire would transform the local landscape as well as devastating families and farmers who would lose their homes and businesses.

Private utility Anglian Water has kicked off a 10-week public consultation which will run until 21 December. This is the first part of a multi-phased consultation process on the proposal before a Development Consent Order is requested. A final decision is expected to be made by the government in 2027.

The application process will see test digging and excavations across the area and, if approved, full-scale construction could be underway within seven years. The reservoir would start supplying water to the Anglian Water region by the end of the 2030s.

The five square km reservoir would be sandwiched between the villages of Scredington, Swaton and Helpringham, with the A52 road near Threekingham marking its southern boundary. It is expected to extend over 1,000 acres – similar in size to Anglian Water’s Grafham reservoir near Huntingdon – and cost an estimated £2bn.

Alex Plant Director of Strategy & Regulation for Anglian Water, said: “The reality is stark for the East of England. Getting these projects underway now means the chances of our taps running dry in the future are significantly reduced.

“We operate in the driest part of the country and receive a third less rainfall than anywhere else in the UK, but we’re also one of the fastest growing regions, with 175,000 new homes to be built in the next five years. Without action we will face a water deficit of millions of litres a day within the next five years – let alone 25 years.”

Anglian Water anticipates that its ‘South Lincolnshire Reservoir’ would be able to supply around 100 million litres of water per day throughout the year. By comparison the utility company loses 183 million litres of water per day across its network, an equivalent leakage of approximately 16-18% when compared to the amount of water running through its pipes each day.

Les Parker a member of Sleaford Climate Action Network (SCAN), said Anglian Water should first demonstrate it has done all it can to reduce demand and thereby the need for additional storage.

“This means not just minimising leaks but also ensuring users, and particularly large industrial users, reduce demand by becoming more efficient.

“We should also ask whether this is the best location from an operational point of view and be sure it causes the lowest ecological impact achievable for any of the workable locations.

“This would mean not only considering existing ‘nature’ but also minimising the impact on land requirement for food production by avoiding high grade agricultural land.”

Parker added that Anglian Water needed to ensure any new reservoir improves the ecology of an area used, including damage caused to local infrastructure during construction.

Farmers Ian and Rebecca Chick have been at Highgate Farm, Scredington, since they bought it seven years ago. They now supply 4,000 pigs a year to Waitrose and Marks & Spencer as well as having 600 sheep, 40 goats and nine alpacas.

“It’s not only about the farm’s value but also the investment we have made, which is twice what we paid for the farm and its land,” said Rebecca.

“We’re fully established now and very productive. The farm is our future and, like everyone else affected, we are totally devastated. So far Anglian Water has not even bothered to turn up at any of the meetings to hear our side of the story.”

Lyn Sills of Spanby, says that after news of the reservoir plan first came out in September the sale of her farmhouse had immediately fallen through.

“I am now in a situation where I am unable to build, unable to sell and unable to remortgage, and Fisher German, the agent for Anglian Water, has requested an eight year option – it’s a joke!” she said.

After meeting with residents, local MP for Sleaford & North Hykeham Dr Carolyn Johnson called for clear and honest communication by Anglian Water.

“Many of my constituents living within the Scredington, Helpringham, Burton, Spanby and Swaton communities will be incredibly concerned. People are understandably distressed about what these proposals, should they go ahead, mean for their homes and livelihoods, with this area being home to many local farmers in particular,” she said.

“Not only are there deep concerns about the location of the reservoir in the first instance, but also about the knock-on effects such as house prices, business plans for farmers and the mental health of those affected by the reservoir.”

The MP says she plans to hold further meetings with Anglian Water to highlight the impact that the proposed location of this reservoir and the timescale for construction would have on her constituents.

“I will keep local residents updated on these meetings and I would encourage those affected to engage fully in the public consultation processes,” she added.

Another of the many farming families devastated by the project is Hannah Thorogood, who runs an organic farm known as The Inkpot which lies right at the heart of the area laid out in the plans.

“Of course we are all heartbroken,” she said. “The whole area is now blighted for a very long time and though Anglian Water have repeatedly indicated just 12 residents would be affected our calculations are that at least 100 people, and probably a lot more, will lose their homes, or land or both. In addition, some 1700 residents in neighbouring villages will potentially be looking at steep, bunded banks.

“There is so much more to this than meets the eye and the massive construction and land moving effort will give it a huge carbon footprint. Among other things, the uncertainty this has delivered is already affecting people’s mental health.”

Over the past decade single-mum Hannah has transformed 18-acres of land into a diverse and vibrant organic farm, recognised nationally and producing award-winning food.

The Inkpot is an example of regenerative agriculture and permaculture with a herd of rare breed Lincolnshire Red cows, sheep and turkeys. It has been home to Hannah’s family since September 2010, in which time they have also planted 3,000 trees and introduced the holistic grazing of cows and sheep.

“We understand that affected residents will not receive the value of their homes or farms until 2029, so effectively none of us can move on with our lives until then. We will be forced to live under this shadow while in the meantime they can come and start intrusive advance surveying,” Hannah added.

In response to questions, Anglian Water said the outer faces of the embankments would be designed to “reflect the character of the existing landscape” with embankment height around the reservoir up to 25m in places.

As a comparison, one of the area’s most recognisable local landmarks – Heckington’s historic eight-sailed windmill – stands at about 20m high above the flat fen landscape.

A spokesperson also stated that the majority of excavated materials will be re-used in construction so they will not need to be transported off site, reducing the number of HGV movements.

“Whilst there will be some associated construction traffic, it is too early to say which routes will be affected and we will work closely with relevant highways authorities, local authorities and the surrounding communities to mitigate impacts as much as possible.”

The spokesperson added that the existing Helpringham to Scredington Road – falling within the reservoir’s planned footprint – would be diverted on a new route around the embankments.

Deputy President of the National Farmer’s Union (NFU) Tom Bradshaw, stressed that the development process must protect the needs of farmers, landowners and tenants, and ensure they are actively involved in decision-making at all stages.

He said the NFU recognised the critical importance of water to build resilience in domestic food production systems, but would be seeking assurances that farming businesses would benefit from the additional water resources of a new reservoir.

“Such major schemes can have significant adverse impacts on farm businesses and the people involved. It’s vital that the design and implementation during construction must be carried out in a way that minimises the impact on land ownership and farming operations.

“We will be working to support any members affected by these schemes and to ensure that agricultural water needs are recognised as an explicit part of future resource use plans.”

Editor’s note: Versions of this article have appeared in Heckington Living magazine and on Central Bylines.

Leaves on the ground

We are inbetween house moves and are back at The Jockeys for a few weeks, a holiday lodge in the stable blocks at Casewick Stud which lies in gently rolling Lincolnshire countryside a few miles east of Stamford.

The Stud adjoins Casewick Hall, the attractive grounds and outbuildings of which have a public footpath running through between the village of Uffington on the main Stamford to Market Deeping road and the attractive little hamlet of Barholm.

Casewick Hall is a medieval country house that was substantially remodelled in the 17th century. It is thought to be the location of a deserted medieval village mentioned as ‘Casuic’ in the Domesday survey and later as Casewick in a tax list of 1334. 

Daylight may be in short supply at this time of the year but compensations abound when the autumn sun breaks through and transforms the late afternoons into fiery golden vistas.

Our short walk from The Jockeys leaves the elegant driveway at Casewick Stud and joins a public footpath at the back of the hall via a gated, tree-lined avenue.

If you turn left the public footpath takes you diagonally across a large arable field until it abuts the main east coast railway, where there is a foot crossing for those heading towards Barholm.

The opposite direction cuts through the grounds and outbuildings of Casewick Hall, many of which have now been converted to homes.

An enclosed driveway lined by a tall beech hedge soon opens into parkland via a cattlegrid and gateway. Sheep wander nonchalantly across the drive and cows graze in the adjoining fields.

After half a mile the driveway crosses another cattlegrid under a second ornate gateway to join a twisting country lane and the pleasant stroll continues towards Uffington.

When the light is right photo opportunities abound and so here is a selection taken on a couple of recent late afternoon walks. Enjoy!

 

Farmers fight flood threat

High tide for the newly formed Wash Frontagers' Group

Vast swaths of the Fens in eastern England could be catastrophically flooded by the next North Sea surge if nothing is done to shore up sea defences.

Much of the country’s prime arable land around the Wash is below sea level and farmers say that more than 80 miles of neglected sea defences need urgent attention.

The £2.3bn spend confirmed by the government for flood projects around the country this week earmarks nothing for raising defences across one of the country’s most at risk areas.

Farmers of land around the Wash marked the first anniversary of last December’s tidal surge with the formation of the Wash Frontagers' Group (WFG) and an urgent call to action.

They are concerned that the region’s farming and food production industry - worth an estimated £3bn to the UK economy - would be fatally damaged if sea walls are breached.

           

Stafford Proctor, who farms at Long Sutton and is WFG chairman, says the Wash sea defences protect some of the country’s most productive farmland.

And he described last winter's floods across the Somerset Levels as being like "a drop in the ocean" compared to what could happen in the Fens.

"Last year's tidal surge showed just how vulnerable our land, homes, businesses and the whole area is to sea water inundation,” he says.

“In Boston alone, 700 homes and businesses were affected. Just think what the effect of a massive inundation would be on the economy of the whole Fen region. It would be devastating.”

           

Recent figures show that behind the protective seawalls there are 365,261 hectares of farm land, more than 80 per cent of which is classified as at risk of flooding.

The region, which includes South Lincolnshire and parts of Cambridgeshire and Norfolk, is known as the Fens Strategic Area and is home to around 655,000 people spread across remote rural communities in towns and villages.

“We were very close a catastrophe across this area and we don't want people to revert back to the status quo as though nothing had happened,” says Proctor.

Stafford Proctor - WFG chairman

According to the National Farmers’ Union (NFU) county adviser for South Lincolnshire, Simon Fisher, raising the sea defences is not just about protecting the future for farmland.

“It includes everything else that makes life tick - people, communities, towns, industry, agriculture, environment, utilities, energy generation and transport infrastructure,” he says.

“A huge amount of fresh produced is produced from South Lincolnshire and the financial contribution this county makes to the economic well-being of this country is worth billions of pounds.

“If we look at the true value of local agriculture and its upward supply chain, it is £3 billion plus and supports in excess of 60,000 jobs in the Fens.

“We need to protect the land and businesses surrounding the Wash and find the funding to raise the sea defences that so many people depend on.

“If you had a major sea inundation around here, no matter how well defended the towns of Boston, Kings Lynn, Wisbech and Spalding are, they are going to be cut off and sat in the middle of a giant pond.”

WFG members (from left): Nicola Currie, Simon Fisher, Simeon Disley, Stafford Proctor, Gavin Lane

Fisher is also dismissive of the concept of ‘managed retreat’, a suggestion put forward by some wildlife organisations, including the RSPB and Lincolnshire Wildlife Trust.

“There are some very good examples of tiny bits of land being left to the sea and that is probably perfectly feasible,” he says.

“But when you are talking of the Fenland area as a whole you'd be heading inland to Peterborough before you get to a point where it wouldn't flood anymore.”

Proctor is sceptical too. “The argument for managed retreat is creating more ‘green’ areas to try and dissipate the waves - but if anyone was down here last year they would have seen there weren't any waves.

“It was like a silent invasion,” he recalls. “The water just came up flat and got higher and higher. No amount of green marsh will protect you against that.”

Negligible sea bank maintenance work on this part of the coast has been carried out since the mid-1908s and WGF estimates the cost to fix the most needy parts of the sea banks would stretch to around £100 million.

“Compared to what is at stake everyone says this makes a lot of sense,” adds Proctor, who farms 2000 acres of Crown Estate land.

“But in order to do something we need public support and funding - the whole point of what we are trying to do is to raise awareness of the need to do something urgently.”

Country Landowners Association (CLA) eastern regional director, Nicola Currie, believes the WGF will only succeed if it garners support from the Environment Agency and Natural England.

“Under the current cost benefit system, farm land and rural areas miss out because government funding for flood and coastal defences is prioritised for schemes that protect people and property,” she says.

Defra minister Dan Rogerson has indicated his support for the WFG project andsuggests that up to 25 per cent more schemes for coastal defence work could go ahead through partnership funding than if costs were met by central government alone.

“There are real challenges to raising funds locally, which is why the CLA is calling on the Environment Agency and Natural England to be fully supportive of this innovative group,” adds Currie.

“If we continue to do nothing eventually we are going to have a major disaster - we just can't keep carrying on having nemesis like this.

“The only solution is a stitch in time - we have to keep going on sea flood defence and this is why we are calling upon government to help both financially and with changes to legislation to make it easier to get this work done.”

Climate change and rising sea levels mean that storm surges are expected to become more frequent in years to come.

They occur when a rising area of low pressure takes pressure off the surface of the sea allowing it to ‘bulge’ upwards before being pushed down through the North Sea by strong winds.

During last December’s surge parts of the North Sea reached higher levels than the devastating floods of 1953 but sea wall defences around the Wash area largely kept the water at bay.

A new blue plaque marks the level of last December's storm surge

The WFG chose to launch its campaign this week alongside the giant sluice gates of a tiny settlement called Surfleet Seas End, where water is poured into sea channels to keep farm land from flooding.

Here, the Welland and Deepings Internal Drainage Board has just erected a small plaque several metres above the normal sluice gate water level.

It serves as a stark reminder of how sea water came to within just a few inches of bursting these banks at the height of the storm surge during the night of 5 December last year.
 
Report and photographs by Clive Simpson - please contact for further information

Building for the future

A positive and infectious energy surrounds Karl Hick. He's a potent mix of athlete, scientist, accountant and developer. And the list of nine companies on his business card seemingly leaves no stone unturned.

With an award-winning home builder to head up, not to mention a timber frame firm, a healthcare and retirement homes specialist, an energy company, a waste company, a renewables firm, and two product supply companies, this is a man with an insatiable appetite for business.

He's been at the helm of the hugely successful Larkfleet Group for a dozen years now, running a growing portfolio of interconnected companies that are steadily setting new national benchmarks in home construction and renewable energy.

Larkfleet - based in Bourne, South Lincolnshire - specialises in building energy-efficient housing and investing in research and development of innovative new building designs, materials and construction methods.

The company is also a major developer of sustainable energy projects, as well as being a provider of energy-efficiency improvements for new and existing buildings.

"From the outset I wanted it to be a different company - built around a sustainability ethos," he says.

"At the time this was a unique proposition in the industry and others were not interested in such a long term approach."

Larkfleet was initially focused entirely on house building and but recognising the opportunity for diversification, the scope was quickly expanded to embrace developing more energy-efficient and sustainable homes, and renewable technologies.

"I can't put the world right but I can do my little bit to help the green industry and make it a commercial success," he says.

Larkfleet - one of the few builders to offer solar panels on new homes as standard - has now built more than 2,500 homes, developed some of the country's biggest solar energy parks and is exploring renewable technologies in waste and power.

Typical of the latter is a new research project to generate ‘carbon-free' electricity via an experimental solar power system installed on land at the Bourne headquarters.

Its panels focus the sun's rays onto water-filled metal tubes and the energy generated can be harnessed to heat water or produce steam to drive a generator for electricity.

The panels are mounted on a rig which rotates to track the movement of the sun through the sky.

Karl hopes that such a system - which is attracting worldwide interest - can be integrated into traditional power stations.

"The solar steam could be fed to the power station generators so fossil fuel would only need to be burned at night or on days when solar power is not enough to meet demand," he says.

"This is very much a long-term project - we will trial the technology fully over the next couple of years before coming to any conclusions about its future potential."

The solar steam initiative is very much a product of his enquiring mind and science background.

In his younger days Karl was also an accomplished athlete and it is the competitive edge from his achievements on the track that he brings to the business world.

His pioneering spirit can also be seen behind the development of two prototype homes alongside the company offices - a Green Deal Eco House and a new PassiveHouse, a test home using new materials and construction methods.

The Green Deal Eco House demonstrates how buildings can incorporate both Green Deal and ECO-funded energy saving measures in housing and commercial buildings.

Larkfleet's PassiveHouse shows how lightweight pultruded glass-reinforced plastic (GRP) composite beams and panels could revolutionise the way in which future homes are built.

The house is designed to be ‘factory built' using mass-produced modular components that can easily installed on site with minimal labour and waste, all much quicker than a traditionally built house.

Its light weight also offers the potential for building such homes on foundations that would rise in response to flooding.

Another aspect of Larkfleet's sustainable energy business is developing large photovoltaic solar farms, adding solar panels to new and existing buildings, and refurbishing existing homes to reduce their carbon footprint, energy use and energy costs.

"The reason solar works so well in the UK is because you need a combination of sun and relatively cool temperatures for optimum energy output," explains Karl.

He describes it as a "very simple technology" but one that still needs government support in order to make it practical to deliver.

"We can do a lot more with solar energy generation in this country and it is something I think should be developed and supported more," he says.

"Wind should also be used more. People don't seem to want it but it is one of our biggest resources in the UK - the difference may come if the lights go out and then people will say ‘why didn't we invest in wind power'?"

Karl believes that if the subsidies given to the nation's nuclear power industry were matched for renewables the country would be in a very different situation.

"Thirty per cent of our energy could come from solar and it would be much cheaper, cleaner and simpler than nuclear," he says.

The scientist who became one of the country's most innovative developers has created a company of our time - a true leader when it comes to home building, sustainable development and renewable energy projects.


The above is adapted from Larkfleet Ascending - an article written by Clive Simpson for The Business Moment magazine.

Let there be light

The Milky Way strode across the sky, a band of faint light spanning almost from horizon to horizon. In the distance, lights sparkled like ships on a dark ocean. Such a dark sky with a myriad twinkling stars is a sight that is becoming all too rare - or even beyond the experience of many.

This is the heart of the Fens at night. A natural planetarium with glorious low horizons in every direction and a pitch dark sky, just far enough from the sodium city lights of Peterborough and the market towns of Stamford and Spalding.

Indeed, this part of South Lincolnshire, an industrial farming and food-producing landscape by day, is by night one of Britain’s dwindling exceptions to our light-polluted lives.

According to the Council for the Protection of Rural England (CPRE), places with the ‘purest’ night-time darkness are (perhaps by definition) among the least populated in the country.

Dartmoor, Exmoor and the Quantock Hills in the south west; Salisbury Plain and the top of the Chilterns in southern England; parts of Lincolnshire to the east; the Black Mountains and the Brecons in Wales; the Yorkshire moors and some of Northumberland; plus large swathes of Scotland, outside major cities and the Borders.

Early this year Sark – the smallest of the four Channel Islands at just a couple of square miles – became the world's first officially-designated ‘Dark Sky Island’.

The US-based International Dark-Sky Association measured Sark's night-time illumination levels and assessed the degree of visibility of constellations in the night sky. And to assist Sark's claim, one of its government officers visited every outside light on the island and recommended measures to cut artificial light seeping into the sky.

Sark is not Britain's only dark success. In 2009 Galloway Forest in Scotland was designated Europe's first ‘Dark Sky Park’. As a result visitor numbers are booming, a new observatory is planned for the edge of the forest and neighbouring local councils have introduced restrictions on outside lighting to preserve the quality of darkness.

The Inner Hebrides’ island of Coll, 13 miles long and three miles wide with two main roads and a small airport, is another dark spot with no security lights on homes, or traffic or street lights.

Much closer to home, the Rutland village of Market Overton recently reduced its light pollution by replacing its old sodium street lights with modern light-emitting diode lamps. Its 39 lamps cost over £20,000 in total to convert but immediately produced an 80 per cent saving in electricity.

These locations, however, remain the exceptions to the light-polluted rule. And they are getting rarer thanks to what the Campaign for Dark Skies describes as ‘wasteful’ over-provision of domestic lighting by British householders.

CPRE has, for several years, urged government action to limit light pollution from street lamps, overnight illumination of shopping centres, office blocks and public buildings, stark upward lighting from floodlit sports complexes and, at the household level, outdoor lights that are unnecessarily bright or disperse their illumination. Of course it would also save a lot of money and energy too – Britain's street lamps alone cost an estimated £500 million a year to run.

The most common forms of such pollution are ‘light trespass’ when illumination from Britain's 22 million homes and 7.5 million street lights, even if designed with the intention of shining downwards, typically also extends upwards. You can see it in this picture of the UK at night as seen by astronauts passing overhead aboard the International Space Station.

Two other common forms are ‘sky glow’ – that orange glow visible for tens of miles around towns and cities easily seen from the air or from distant roads – and ‘glare’, the harsh white light on some modern housing estates and golf driving ranges at night.

As October marches onwards, here in the northern hemisphere we are plunging headlong into days of less daylight, longer nights and the clocks going back – all marking the onset of winter. And, while we say we prefer it lighter for longer, in reality most of us only now experience a limited degree of darkness.

Modern electricity's triumph over the night keeps us all busier. We live in a fast-moving, fully lit world where night still happens but is more of an optional experience – a kind of failed daylight. Our 24/7 supermarket culture has done it’s best to phase out the night.

Yet slowness and silence – the different rhythm of the night – are a necessary correction to the day. Life is too short to be all daylight. Moments of life take on a different quality at night-time, where the moon reflects the light of the sun and we have time to reflect what life is to us. So why not turn down the lights and rest awhile? Night is not less – it's more.

 

The Lighthouse Keeper is written by Clive Simpson - for more information, commission enquiries or to re-publish any of his articles click here for contact details