Site chosen for £600m power plant

The new station will produce enough power for almost two million homes

An energy firm is to build a new £600m gas power station in Nottinghamshire.

Two potential sites had been identified by RWE npower and the company has now confirmed the power station will be built at Staythorpe near Newark.

It already has planning permission for the power station which will have four generating units, producing enough power for almost two million homes.

Work on the site is expected to start later in the year and should bring 80 long-term jobs to the area.

The other site which had been under consideration was at Pembroke Dock.

'Traffic grief'

The company said it would continue to seek planning consent for the site in west Wales with a view to building a second gas power station at some point in the future.

Tim Calver, the Staythorpe Power Station project manager, said the station would bring benefits to the area.

"Staythorpe will be a modern, highly-efficient power station and will produce less than half the CO2 per unit of electricity than an existing coal station.

"With a quarter of UK power plants due for closure over the next 10 years, it is vital generators commit to the construction of large-scale plants to ensure the UK has a secure, affordable electricity supply into the future.

"We will work closely with parish councils and the surrounding communities to provide information on what the plant will look like and explain how it will be developed," said Mr Calver.

But Patrick Mercer, MP for Newark, said he was not yet convinced of the benefits of the new power station.

"In the short term I can see that it's going to create a lot of construction jobs but on the other side of the coin I can see that it's going to create a huge amount of traffic grief.

"In the longer term, I'm not convinced that we're going to see very much profit for the Newark area in terms of well-paid, sustainable jobs going to Newark people."

Staythorpe Power Station originally received planning consent in 1993 and construction began five years later.

But work was put on hold in 2000 after the government said there were enough power stations to meet the UK's electricity demand.