Nearly 14,000 people have signed a petition against a 180km line of 50-metre tall pylons through the East Anglian countryside.
The East Anglia GREEN network of pylons would connect Norwich to Tilbury in Essex, via a substation in Bramford with 50-metre tall 400kV pylons, but cables could be put underground at points – such as when it goes through the Dedham Vale Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty near Stratford St Mary.
But the plans have seen a significant amount of opposition. A petition launched by Rosie Pearson, calling for the pylon plans to be shelved and put the cables under the sea instead, has received nearly 14,000 signatures since it was launched around three weeks ago.
However, National Grid bosses, who drew up the East Anglia GREEN plans, said the plans are necessary to carry green energy from offshore wind turbines. They added they were carefully considering local feedback on the plans.
The petition said East Anglia's landscape is "precious, historic and beautiful" and it "must not be desecrated by pylons". It adds that doing so would damage tourism and hospitality businesses.
In Essex, protestors have also criticised National Grid for failing to consult with enough people.
Peter Batchelor, from the Ardleigh Matters group, said: "These huge pylons, which are the height of 10 London buses, not only look ugly, there are serious questions about their environmental and health impact. Hardly anyone knows about these plans because National Grid has only informed a small number of people."
A group of East Anglian MPs whose constituency the pylons would go through, also said they would launch a judicial review if the plans were given the go-ahead.
A National Grid spokeswoman said: “The government has set an ambition to connect up to 50 GW of offshore wind by 2030 – enough green energy to power every home in the country. It is National Grid’s responsibility to connect new generation into the national transmission system and get it to where it is needed, safely and securely.
"We are governed by a number of licences and regulatory obligations and we’ve been carrying out assessments and studies to find the most appropriate way to achieve this in East Anglia, and in other parts of the country. We feel these proposals best meet our obligations.
“We are at an early stage and we want to work closely with local communities as we develop the project further. We’re holding this consultation so people can tell us about the impacts they believe this project will have on them, and where they live. This is really important to us and we encourage people to talk to us and take part in the consultation.
“We will carefully consider feedback from local communities, along with information from assessments and surveys to help us develop our proposals in more detail.”
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