THE company behind a controversial bid to create a biomass plant at Winkleigh has announced a delay in its plans.

Peninsula Power, the firm behind the two phase £76-million biomass plant scheme for Winkleigh airfield announced last week that a new schedule had been drawn up for taking the scheme forward in the New Year.

Under the new timescale, the submission of a planning application to Torridge District Council has been postponed until the end of February next year.

The company had previously hoped to submit an application before the end of the year, however they say the 'huge volume' of interest in the scheme made the delay necessary.

Tony FitzSimons, chairman of Peninsula Power said: 'The huge volume of information required by all interested parties and the necessity for examining the results of the independent Environmental Impact Assessment in some considerable detail has prompted us to change our timescale which we hope will now facilitate informed and open

debate.

'Our wish is to ensure that all decisions are based on hard information and there is no point in rushing such a critical point in this development.'

Mr FitzSimons said a three day public exhibition as well as a public meeting would be held in Winkleigh before the company applied for planning consent.

'We will also be sending information leaflets to every household within a 10-mile radius of the proposed site which amounts to some 17,000 addresses,' he said.

Mr FitzSimons said the company anticipated that a website will go live at around the same time which will contain a 'Frequently Asked Questions' section and a facility to pose further questions up to the time of the planning application.

Opponents of the scheme said they suspected the company had been somewhat surprised by the level of concern their plans had raised, which had led them to announce this delay.

David Lausen, secretary of the Winkleigh Society said: 'An awful lot of interest groups are very concerned about this scheme which is really out of all proportion to a rural area.

'Winkleigh does not have the transport infrastructure to cope with the heavy lorries that would have to come and go and would cause considerable diesel and noise pollution, that would be detrimental to the environment.'

Mr Lausen added: 'A number of interest groups are being set up to fight this, because they are concerned about the size and the implications of the scheme. Interest groups are mushrooming all over the place.'