New buildings need approval

Failure to submit a correct flood risk assessment should see retrospective planning approval for a waste recycling site refused.

Midwest Polychem applied to retain three structures already put up at its Holbeach Hurn site.

A planning enforcement team saw the buildings during a monitoring site visit.

The waste processing facility is approved, but it is in Flood Zone 3 so a site-specific flooding risk must be carried out for any other building or structure.

“A site specific flood risk assessment has not been provided in line with the requirements of the National Planning Policy Framework and the applicant has failed to demonstrate unequivocally that the buildings/structures themselves, and their use for the storage of waste materials, are adequately protected from the risks of flooding,” says the recommendation to members of the county planning committee which meets on Monday.

The report going to members says the additional structures are ‘at greater risk and probability of flooding’.

It also says the applicant has been asked for a revised assessment “in order to respond to the Environment Agency’s objection’, this has not been received.

“As submitted, the development is not in line with the requirements of National Planning Policy Framework,” concludes the report.

The company was granted permission for the recycling facility by Lincolnshire County Council late last year.

But a loading bay canopy, reception area and a steel-framed structure with a flat roof have all been constructed with no permission.

The former Laurel Lodge Farm was aiming to initially recycle 2,800 tonnes of plastic bottles a month.
Initially the company was going to focus on old water bottles bought as waste from other companies.

The report to the planning committee members says that the site has ‘yet to go into full production.’

“The information and schemes submitted were not considered acceptable and so have recently been refused. The requirements of those conditions therefore have yet to be satisfied.”

South Holland District Council has not put forward any objections to the retrospective application.