Recycling and waste management firm Biffa has been granted planning permission to build an energy from waste facility at Newhurst Quarry in Shepshed, Leicestershire, after the firm successfully appealed the council’s previous decisions to block it.

Since Biffa’s original submission of planning permission for the site in December 2009, Leicestershire County Council has twice refused Biffa permission to build the £200-million structure after receiving thousands of objections from residents and environmentalists. The decision was overturned on 29 June after Secretary of State Eric Pickles intervened and approved the plans following an inspector’s report (IR) from the Department for Communities and Local Government (DCLG).

According to a letter from Richard Watson, Decision Officer at the DCLG to Robert Bruce at Biffa’s lawyers, Nabarro LLP, Pickles intervened ‘because the appeal relates to proposals of major significance for the delivery of the government's climate change programme and energy policies’ and ‘like the Inspector, the Secretary of State [was] satisfied that the requirements of the [Environmental] Regulations have been met’ and ‘considers that sufficient information has been provided for him to assess the environmental impact of the application’.

Helen Loydall, Liberal Democrat Planning spokesman, voiced disappointment over the overturning, saying: "I believed that… a decision taken locally by local elected councillors meant something.”

She added: “My concern is that the ability of Mr Pickles to ignore the views of local communities and the decision of the Council will encourage developers to use appeals to get their controversial plans approved."

This is not the first time Pickles has intervened in rulings over energy-from-waste plants, having previously flexed his parliamentary muscles over disputed cases in Cornwall and Norfolk.

According to the most recent Biffa plans, the plant, which will be located adjacent to Junction 23 of the M1, will provide enough electricity to power the equivalent of 42,000 homes and divert 300,000 tonnes of waste from landfill in Leicestershire.

Jeff Rhodes, Biffa company Planning & Permitting Manager, said: “This is a really important decision for Biffa and for Leicestershire, as the area currently has no long-term landfill diversion solution for waste. We believe that it makes no environmental or financial sense to put waste which we cannot recycle into landfill when the value inherent within it can be used to generate renewable energy. It is gratifying to see that the Secretary of State agreed and considered the reasons for approving it to be ‘substantial and compelling’.”

The IR concluded that the plant would produce more power than all the current wind and sewage gas generating schemes in Leicestershire and ‘considerably more than all the landfill gas generating stations’ and went on to say that the proposal would save around 87,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide per year.

Following consultation between Biffa, Leicestershire County Council and English Heritage, the plans were amended prior to the appeal to include tree planting in Garendon Park and restoration work to Grade I and II listed buildings within the park.

The decision comes after reports that Montagu Private Equity and Global Infrastructure Partners have been looking at a strategic review of Biffa, which could see them potentially selling the whole, or parts of the company. Biffa became a private company in 2008 for £1.2bn but the business has since been hit by the economic downturn.