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Eco Park developers welcome new canal side homes




Posted by Tony Flynn on 6th April 2011 at 01:05 PM
Eco Park developers welcome new canal side homes
Salford planners have given the go-ahead for new homes on a derelict industrial site alongside the Bridgewater Canal - and the scheme has been welcomed by Sky Properties, whose proposed Green Lane Eco Park is located across the canal.

Outline permission has been given to Arndale Properties Management for 175 new homes on the site of the former GUS warehouse in Eccles.

The approval has been welcomed by Sky Properties, which views the housing scheme as complementary to its submitted plans for a £70m state-of-the-art facility to recycle business waste and generate renewable energy.

Green Lane Eco Park would be constructed on disused industrial land off Green Lane, Monton, Salford, to contribute to sustainable waste management in Greater Manchester and create more than 60 full-time jobs, and potentially provide enough energy to power 15,000 homes as well as heat for local businesses.

Sky Properties say that the new canalside homes could receive their heating and power from waste treated at the Eco Park, which would incorporate a unique gasification technology from ENERGOS, a division of Salford-based award-winning sustainable energy business ENER-G.

Sky Properties’ Anthony Hirsch says:

"The site of the former GUS Home Shopping Warehouse is on the opposite side of the Bridgewater Canal from the proposed Green Lane Eco Park, which has been sensitively designed taking into account the Bridgewater Canal masterplan and aspirations for the Monton area.

“The GUS site redevelopment and other development projects in the vicinity of Green Lane provide significant potential for synergies with the proposed Eco Park through opportunities to maximise the benefits from combined heat and power.

“The Eco Park would also be well placed to serve any waste management requirements associated with increased economic activity in the local area. In determining this application, which was submitted 6 months after the Green Lane Eco Park application, Officers and Members should have considered issues associated with the combined redevelopment of both the Green Lane Eco Park and GUS sites."

The Sky Properties application is expected to be heard by the Council in May.

The proposals submitted by Sky Properties for the Green Lane Eco Park, are supported by two leading business organisations, the Greater Manchester Chamber of Commerce and the North West Institute of Directors.

The Eco Park would treat and manage about 240,000 tonnes of local business waste each year via a Materials Recovery Facility (MRF), an Anaerobic Digestion (AD) plant and a Gasification plant.

The facility would significantly reduce the amount of business waste being transported to landfill sites across the region.

Says Mr Hirsch: “The Green Lane Eco Park offers the opportunity to regenerate disused employment land through an investment of £70m in the local community, creating jobs and training placements and supporting local businesses by offering a more cost-effective and environmentally responsible way of managing local business waste.”

The pioneering development is required because:

Landfill is an expensive and unsustainable waste management option - European Union and UK waste management targets mean that as much waste as possible must be diverted from landfill for financial and environmental reasons;

It is vital that we treat waste as a resource by maximising recycling and recovering value from the remaining waste we produce, rather than throwing these materials into landfill sites;

The UK has to meet renewable energy targets and diversify its energy sources - energy generated from waste that can’t be recycled can help local areas like Monton to become more self-sufficient in producing its own energy, and to attract and retain other businesses and jobs in the future;

Managing waste in the ways offered by the Eco Park will support local businesses and provide direct employment for more than 60 people once operational and many more indirectly.

Source: SKV Communications.

Report as offensive or innapropriate Comment by TomSO ( member )  7th April 2011
I don't think it's an unreasonable request to put the source at the header of the article rather than the footer. I shall put this to the Editor.

Report as offensive or innapropriate Comment by Monty  7th April 2011
Yes come on Mr Editor and team, please make any press release clear at the outset for any article. This will ensure that the less observant readers do not think the content is some form of real news and can immediately identify the content as in house propganda, or should I say 'an expression of views by the interested party'....

Report as offensive or innapropriate Comment by as  7th April 2011
Editor - suggestion. When this sort of PR material is published, could it be made a bit clearer by putting it at the top of the articles with words to the effect its a commercial press release. In many cases these border on advertising, but we need to differentiate between what is proper news and what is propoganda - this applies not just to this hogwash but anything.

Report as offensive or innapropriate Comment by as  6th April 2011
I'm pretty certain they won't want to be looking over a rubbish tip.

Report as offensive or innapropriate Comment by Editor ( member )  6th April 2011
@more spin, this article WAS written by the Sky properties PR Team - it says so on the Source at the bottom of the article. As with most press releases we publish them as they are to let the community decide, rather than trying to rewrite them under our own name.

Report as offensive or innapropriate Comment by more spin  6th April 2011
this article was pure propaganda for sky properties no mention by the writer of the campaign [backed by mp's ] to stop this pollutant from getting planning permission or the damage to the health and safety of people in the surrounding area it's as if the article was written by sky properties p.r. team

Report as offensive or innapropriate Comment by Seadog  6th April 2011
I don't believe it!! Is there no limit to the cheek of Sky properties? They are still spouting their original case, which has many times been shown to be far from the truth. "Power and heating for local homes"... not true. "More than 60 full-time jobs"... not true. "Green Lane Eco park has been sensitively designed taking into account the Bridgewater Canal Master Plan"... not true. Plus many other inaccuracies. Sky do not mention the 960 HGV loads of rubbish which will thunder through Monton's narrow lanes every week. Sky do not mention the houses and school less then 100metres away from their incinerator chimney. Sky do not mention that to keep their incinerator burning efficiently they will have to bring in rubbish from many miles outside the area as insufficient waste will be generated locally. When asked at a public meeting whether he would like to live close to an incinerator, Mr Hirsche, (owner of Sky properties) was eventually forced to admit that he wouldn't. How he can say that the new housing development is welcomed by Sky beggars belief. He must know that the housing developers went ahead with the proposal knowing that the overwhelming support the 'Say-No' campaign should, in a democratic society, be difficult for the decision makers to ignore. He must know that even more houses being built around his ill-conceived incinerator must be yet another nail in its coffin. Lets hope this turns out to be the case.

Report as offensive or innapropriate Comment by bob  6th April 2011
if these new homes are on the GUS site then they are in Winton not Monton, funny how the highly paid planners can't read a map, but given the c***-ups they make not surprising!

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