Pinewoods Conservation Group is rallying support once again to prevent Harrogate Spring Water from expanding its bottling plant into Rotary Wood.
The water company, which is now owned by multinational firm Danone, was granted outline planning permission in 2017 to expand into Rotary Wood in the Pinewoods.
Danone recently bid to vary the terms of this by increasing the size of the bottling plant into the woodlands. Harrogate’s planning committee rejected this in January after almost 400 people objected.
Many objectors were jubilant at the outcome but the original outline permission in 2017 still applies.
Pinewoods Conservation Group now suspects it will be brought back to the council’s planning committee before May and warns that, if approved, will result in “massive ecological loss”.
Although it has outline permission, Danone would need to go through a second stage of the application process, known as reserved matters, to ratify details such as the appearance of the bottling plant and the felling of trees in Rotary Wood.
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A document prepared on behalf of Danone last year said the reserved matters application “is committed to retaining where possible as many trees on-site and relocating others”.
It adds that additional trees will be planted within Rotary Wood to replace those that would be lost.
A spokesman for Pinewoods Conservation Group, however, described the application as a “massive backwards step” from the one that was refused in January. He added:
“There is no offer of any compensatory land. That is a massive backwards step from the previous rejected application.
“If approved, this would result in a massive ecological loss for Harrogate and the Pinewoods. As such we are encouraging our members and supporters to formally object to this application as soon as possible.”
Harrogate Spring Water declined to comment.
