Onshore wind turbine projects could be revived to slash South Tyneside carbon emissions after planning changes

The newly-elected Labour Government, days after the General Election in July, 2024, announced plans to remove the “de facto ban on onshore wind in England”, which had been in place since 2015.

This included the removal of tests from national planning policy which previously set a “higher bar than is set for other forms of development”, including the need for a proposal to “prove community support”.

Changes to the National Planning Policy Framework aimed to allow “onshore wind applications [to be] treated in the same way as other energy development proposals” and to boost onshore wind developments across the country.

After previously facing difficulties progressing plans for an onshore wind turbine at Middlefields Depot in South Shields, senior figures at South Tyneside Council have confirmed onshore wind projects are back on the table.

This includes plans being progressed for a new wind turbine at South Tyneside Council’s Jarrow Viking Energy Network, with a planning application due to be submitted this year.

There has also been confirmation that the council will “revisit” plans for a wind turbine at the Middlefields Depot in South Shields in future, although the time-scales around this project are unclear.

“You may recall that there were some planning challenges at the time that we had to overcome in relation to the Middlefields wind turbine,” said Phil Dixon, the council’s head of strategic housing and assets.

“Those planning issues have somewhat moved on since then, there’s been changes in Government policy.

“However, between then and now, we have moved to look to develop a wind turbine on the Viking Energy Network site to complement the network and to generate further electricity.

“We plan to submit planning for that next month hopefully, with a summer 2026 completion of that scheme.

“Now that those planning restrictions have changed somewhat around onshore wind, and the ability to install wind turbines without there being one there already, we will look to move to the Middlefields scheme and revisit that following the development of the one at the Viking Energy Network in Jarrow.”

The council officer was speaking at a meeting of South Tyneside Council’s Housing and Environment Scrutiny Committee on Thursday, March 20, 2025, and was responding to a question from independent councillor Andrew Guy.

Cllr Guy had asked for an update on the council’s plans for an onshore wind turbine, which he described as a “significant part” of the council’s drive to reduce future emissions and meet 2030 targets.

The council officer’s response confirmed that at least two wind turbine sites are under consideration, with developed plans for Jarrow and confirmation that Middlefields in South Shields would be revisited in future.

Previous council plans for a wind turbine at Middlefields Depot appeared on a council Planning Committee agenda back in 2022, however, the scheme was recommended for refusal by the local authority’s own planning officers as the wind turbine clashed with national planning policies.

The council planning application was withdrawn days before the council planning meeting was due to take place following, what the council described as, “a number of new objections”.

Concerns from council planning officers, set out in a previous Planning Committee report, included the proposed wind turbine “giving rise to significant adverse impacts to both visual and residential amenity nearby and to the east of the proposal”.

Although council planners noted the council’s carbon reduction commitments, they said this could not outweigh the “very clear and specific [national] policy stance in relation to new wind turbines”, including a “general presumption against new wind turbines, unless they can meet the very specific criteria that is set out.”

Concerns were also raised by the council’s then opposition leader, independent councillor Glenn Thompson, about the “financial impact” of the council decision to withdraw the wind turbine scheme and take it back to the drawing board.

The matter was later discussed by the council’s Overview and Scrutiny Co-ordinating and Call-In Committee on December 6, 2022, but the discussion was held behind closed doors, with the press and public excluded.

This was due to “the likely disclosure of exempt information” as defined under part of the Local Government Act 1972, the council agenda stated.

Official minutes from the meeting confirmed that the presentation included “background to the proposals, the wind turbine details, the contract timelines and the planning timeline”.

The “financial amounts spent to date” were not disclosed in the public minutes, but it was noted that “due process was followed”, that “money spent on the scheme feasibility was beneficial when considering other potential wind turbine sites” and that the scheme “has the potential to proceed”, with council officers “observing potential changes regarding national planning policy.”

According to the official meeting minutes, the scrutiny committee agreed that the “green agenda, including proposals such as wind turbines, was supported” and noted “communication could have been better” around the proposal, which “would have helped to ensure the relevant facts were available as soon as possible.”

Councillor Ernest Gibson, Labour cabinet member for neighbourhoods and climate change at South Tyneside Council, has confirmed a planning application for a wind turbine at Viking Energy Network Jarrow (VENJ) is expected “in the coming months”.

“Following our recent successes, most notably our award-winning Viking and Hebburn Energy Schemes, we continue to explore opportunities for further ways to produce energy through use of renewable technologies,” Cllr Gibson said.

“This demonstrates our resolute ongoing commitment to reducing both costs and carbon emissions.

“We are in the process of developing proposals for onshore wind, through development of a wind turbine at the VENJ site in Jarrow, which will complement the energy scheme.

“A planning application is expected in the coming months, and if approved, it would make a further contribution towards our carbon neutral ambitions.

“We will continue to explore further opportunities across other areas of renewables and demonstrate innovation and leadership in this area.”