A councillor has voiced concerns about plans to spend large sums of money creating Northumberland's first biodiversity net gain site on a former surface mine.
Net gain sites were introduced in the Government's landmark environment bill, and require developers and planners to create habits that can increase biodiversity by a net gain of 10% in and around developments.
The policy is due to come into force in autumn 2023, but due to the sheer size of the planned Britishvolt gigafactory - said to be "one of the biggest buildings in the world, ever" - Northumberland County Council planners chose to impose the condition on the company.
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It meant finding a significantly large site capable of providing the needed gain reasonably close to Cambois. The 67-hectare Potland Burn site, a former open cut coal mine near Ashington, met all those requirements.
Speaking at Wednesday's meeting of the council's communities and place overview and scrutiny committee, the authority's environment and design team manager and county ecologist, David Feige, explained how the project would work.
He said: "This is going to be mandatory for most planning applications from Autumn 2023. This site is currently of low ecological value which means we can effect significant change.
"It will need to be suitable for wading birds and a wide range of invertebrates. We know we're going to need more land than just for Britishvolt, because we also need to have land for supply chain companies, so this is the site.
"This isn't going to be a one-off. It is going to be commonplace for us as net gain becomes mandatory."
However, Coun Richard Dodd was concerned about the cost of the scheme. A report presented to members revealed the cost would be £450,000 in capital funded from the council's reserves and a £1,688,400 expenditure budget funded using the developer contributions.
The money will be used to pay for the creation of the site and its upkeep over the next 30 years - but Coun Dodd, who is also a farmer, felt the land could be put to better use.
He said: "£1.6 million is a lot of money. The world has changed somewhat this year, I know as a farmer. We see the price of wheat has doubled which will have an impact on somebody somewhere.
"As a farmer I'm still cutting up trees from Storm Arwen. On the bits of woodland I'm involved in, it's amazing how natural regrowth takes place. What would happen if we just abandoned it at no cost?
"We're heading for a rough time. With £1.6 million, you're starting to talk big numbers. Farmers have been doing this on these lands for centuries.
"This land could produce something, it could pay something. Grain and food are going to be more important than a lot of things."
It was pointed out to Coun Dodd that due to the previous use of the land - as a mine and previously as arable land - the soil would have a low seed count and would regrow slowly. Therefore, taking action to improve biodiversity would have considerable benefit.
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