Nautilus has changed plans deciding to come to Friston after all, and Ofgem has held a consultation on these changes for which we had to submit our views by 15 August.
The revised plans will require the construction of a dedicated substation at Friston and an associated converter station at Saxmundham. Ofgem’s invitation to reply was extended to stakeholders and interested parties. This included our supporters who submitted feedback in large numbers, objecting to National Grid’s ill-conceived plans to develop up to four converter stations at Saxmundham and three substations at Friston which will turn East Suffolk into an industrial energy mega-hub, when there is an alternative offshore solution.
This Ofgem Nautilus Consultation paper is a poorly prepared and biased evaluation. The whole analysis depends on a large number of assumptions, which are neither listed nor stated and therefore cannot be tested, proved or disproved. That is sloppy and unacceptable with a matter of such significance.
SEAS has submitted its own detailed response, raising questions about the technical benefits of these proposals which are clearly in the interests of NGV, but evidently not in the interests of ecology, the tourism economy or communities. READ it in full HERE.