Today's most viewed
| LOCAL NEWS | |  | | | OTHER SPORT | | |
|
|
|
Gas storage gets go-ahead
A MAJOR gas storage facility on Portland has been given the go-ahead by councillors.
Portland Gas Storage Ltd won approval for its £500 million project at a meeting of Dorset County Council's planning committee.
The former naval base at Upper Osprey Quay will now become a main storage facility for supplying gas to the South West.
It will meet about five per cent of the country's storage needs.
Speaking after the meeting, Portland Gas Storage chief executive Andrew Hindle said: "We're naturally very happy with this decision, especially as it was made in Dorset with local representatives who know and care for this special part of the world.
"The decision is good news for South Dorset and for the nation as a whole."
Councillors voted unanimously in favour of the facility, which will comprise 14 underground storage caverns.
Some 23 miles of pipeline will run from Portland to Mappowder in North Dorset - the nearest point to the national grid's gas network.
Pipework will also be created to pump in seawater to dissolve salt deposits to create the caverns.
A pipeline from Portland will take resulting brine to West Stafford where 12 wells will be created to store it.
The caverns could be jointly capable of storing up to 35 billion cubic feet of gas.
3:58pm Friday 16th May 2008
Print 
Email this 
CommentPosted by: chanticleer, here, there, and everywhere on 6:22pm Fri 16 May 08
[quote]Pipework will also be created to pump in seawater to dissolve salt deposits to create the caverns.
A pipeline from Portland will take resulting brine to West Stafford where 12 wells will be created to store it.[/quote]
Nooo...thats the second time in one week that the Echo has misreported this planning application!
For the record, sea water will be used to dissolve the salt deposits and produce underground caverns. The resulting concentrated salt liquid will be pumped back to the surface [bold]and dumped into Weymouth Bay via an outfall pipe[/bold]. It will [bold]not[/bold] be taken to storage wells at West Stafford . Those brine wells are for a completely different purpose concerned with the operation of the storage caverns, once construction has ceased.
This information is included in Portland Gas' Envirnmental Statement (which the Echo obviously hasn't read) and also appears in a film which can be viewed on the Portland Gas website.
Portland Gas estimate that the Weymouth Bay brine outfall will operate at a rate of [bold]2,000 cubic metres of high salinity liquid per hour![/bold] As the whole excavation period is set to take many years, you can imagine that thats one heck of a lot of brine to be dumped in Weymouth Bay.
Especially when you realise that the salinity of seawater is about [bold]3.5%[/bold] and that of the proposed discharge material is [bold]25%![/bold]
Quite a difference - and one which is likely to adversely effect the local marine environment.
Pipework will also be created to pump in seawater to dissolve salt deposits to create the caverns.
A pipeline from Portland will take resulting brine to West Stafford where 12 wells will be created to store it.
Nooo...thats the second time in one week that the Echo has misreported this planning application!
For the record, sea water will be used to dissolve the salt deposits and produce underground caverns. The resulting concentrated salt liquid will be pumped back to the surface
and dumped into Weymouth Bay via an outfall pipe. It will
not be taken to storage wells at West Stafford . Those brine wells are for a completely different purpose concerned with the operation of the storage caverns, once construction has ceased.
This information is included in Portland Gas' Envirnmental Statement (which the Echo obviously hasn't read) and also appears in a film which can be viewed on the Portland Gas website.
Portland Gas estimate that the Weymouth Bay brine outfall will operate at a rate of
2,000 cubic metres of high salinity liquid per hour! As the whole excavation period is set to take many years, you can imagine that thats one heck of a lot of brine to be dumped in Weymouth Bay.
Especially when you realise that the salinity of seawater is about
3.5% and that of the proposed discharge material is
25%!
Quite a difference - and one which is likely to adversely effect the local marine environment.
Posted by: DingDonG, Wilds of Wiltshire on 8:49pm Fri 16 May 08
[quote]Posted by: chanticleer, here, there, and everywhere on 6:22pm today[/quote][quote]Especially when you realise that the salinity of seawater is about 3.5% and that of the proposed discharge material is 25%![/quote] My maths is a bit rusty, but, say Weymouth Bay is about 10km square and average 10m deep, thats 10 to the power of 9 cubic metres.
It would take 5 years (at 2000 cubic metres per hour) to fill.
With a good tide twice a day, I guess the salinity difference wouldn't be detectable more than a few 100 metres from the discharge.
Remember the Arish Mell calculations & measurements while Winfrith was discharging low level radioactive material into the sea? The crabs never did glow in the dark!
I understand your concerns (especially misinformation in the press as to where the concentrated brine will go) but maybe the key question (after safety) is...will it benefit the area? (Bet Weymouth & Portland WON'T get cheap gas!!!)
Posted by: chanticleer, here, there, and everywhere on 6:22pm today
Especially when you realise that the salinity of seawater is about 3.5% and that of the proposed discharge material is 25%!
My maths is a bit rusty, but, say Weymouth Bay is about 10km square and average 10m deep, thats 10 to the power of 9 cubic metres.
It would take 5 years (at 2000 cubic metres per hour) to fill.
With a good tide twice a day, I guess the salinity difference wouldn't be detectable more than a few 100 metres from the discharge.
Remember the Arish Mell calculations & measurements while Winfrith was discharging low level radioactive material into the sea? The crabs never did glow in the dark!
I understand your concerns (especially misinformation in the press as to where the concentrated brine will go) but maybe the key question (after safety) is...will it benefit the area? (Bet Weymouth & Portland WON'T get cheap gas!!!)
Posted by: chanticleer, here, there, and everywhere on 11:41pm Fri 16 May 08
Lol...I'm not for one minute suggesting that the whole of Weymouth Bay will fill with saturated saline leachate - I just feel that to rely on the tide to take away your waste material is an outdated and irresponsible course of action. I'm surprised that an experienced company such as Portland Gas would still in this day and age cling to the old, discredited, method of disposal such as 'dilute and disperse'.
I do recall the Arish Mell calculations and have to say that nowadays they make for rather alarming reading. Examination of the Exercise MERMAID scientific report, which investigated the discharge to sea of radioactive effluent from Winfrith via the Arish Mell outfall pipes, reveals that the safe levels for permitted discharge were based on two main factors: experience gained from similar discharges at Windscale (aka Sellafield), and a survey of the habits of Dorset residents (which Harwell seem to have somehow 'lost'. The Exercise MERMAID report mentions that levels of radioactive discharge to Weymouth Bay should be of a scale that: [bold]‘anyone may safely spend 100 hours a year at the low water mark on a beach’[/bold] . The report omits to mention mention what dangers might be faced by those whose employment required them to spend longer periods on the foreshore!
With regard to local fish stock, the Harwell report states: [bold]‘These [lobsters] also assume major importance because of their low mobility and other characteristics resulting in their concentrating activity more effectively than plaice, the most important fish off Windscale. In the calculations made for the safe permissible discharge it is assumed that fish in Dorset will take up a proportion of the discharge ten times greater than at Windscale’.[/bold]
So even though local crabs might not actually glow, long term consumption of lobsters, especially those caught from near the Lulworth Banks, may indeed have had some adverse health effect on local residents.
Lol...I'm not for one minute suggesting that the whole of Weymouth Bay will fill with saturated saline leachate - I just feel that to rely on the tide to take away your waste material is an outdated and irresponsible course of action. I'm surprised that an experienced company such as Portland Gas would still in this day and age cling to the old, discredited, method of disposal such as 'dilute and disperse'.
I do recall the Arish Mell calculations and have to say that nowadays they make for rather alarming reading. Examination of the Exercise MERMAID scientific report, which investigated the discharge to sea of radioactive effluent from Winfrith via the Arish Mell outfall pipes, reveals that the safe levels for permitted discharge were based on two main factors: experience gained from similar discharges at Windscale (aka Sellafield), and a survey of the habits of Dorset residents (which Harwell seem to have somehow 'lost'. The Exercise MERMAID report mentions that levels of radioactive discharge to Weymouth Bay should be of a scale that:
‘anyone may safely spend 100 hours a year at the low water mark on a beach’ . The report omits to mention mention what dangers might be faced by those whose employment required them to spend longer periods on the foreshore!
With regard to local fish stock, the Harwell report states:
‘These also assume major importance because of their low mobility and other characteristics resulting in their concentrating activity more effectively than plaice, the most important fish off Windscale. In the calculations made for the safe permissible discharge it is assumed that fish in Dorset will take up a proportion of the discharge ten times greater than at Windscale’.
So even though local crabs might not actually glow, long term consumption of lobsters, especially those caught from near the Lulworth Banks, may indeed have had some adverse health effect on local residents.
Posted by: Positron, Rodwell on 12:18am Sat 17 May 08
Can't wait for the next installment, it sounds like either way we've got Dead Sea 2!
It's amazing that two seemingly knowledgeable people can have such opposing views, lets hope that Winfrith [italic]and[/italic] Portland Gas have both got their calculations right.
Can't wait for the next installment, it sounds like either way we've got Dead Sea 2!
It's amazing that two seemingly knowledgeable people can have such opposing views, lets hope that Winfrith
and Portland Gas have both got their calculations right.
What are these links for?
If you liked this article and would like to share it with others on the web who might be searching for good content we've made it easy for you to do it.
At the bottom of all articles, you'll see links to six sites. These sites - commonly called 'social bookmark' or 'social news' sites - have large communities of web users who share and rate interesting, useful and fun things on the web.
Clicking the links will automatically add the address of the story you are reading to one of these sites, letting you share it with others. Each site will ask you to register to share stories. Registration is free and once a member, you can store, recommend and search for stories that interest you.
More on Digg
More on del.icio.us
More on Furl
More on reddit
More on NowPublic/
More on Yahoo!
