Electric charging points for garage

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Monday, 10 October 2022 14:47

By Gavin McEwan - Local Democracy Reporter

The current petrol station showing the trees which would be removed.

A prominent Herefordshire petrol station plans to install electric vehicle charging points and jet washers.

The plan, for the BP petrol station at the OK Diner roundabout where the A44 meets the A49 just outside of Leominster, consists of six charging points, three jet wash bays, two of them covered, and an electrical substation.

These would be installed on the south side of the service area near the roundabout, in place of four of the current lorry bays.

Six trees would also be removed, according to plans submitted by the station’s operator, Motor Fuel Group of St Albans.

Lying between the River Lugg and Ridgemoor and Cheaton brooks, the area is classed as in flood risk zone 3, or likely to flood more than once every 100 years, requiring a flood risk assessment with the application.

This says the substation and charging points “have been raised as high as reasonably possible”, and would be “above ground level which provide some form of resilience”.

But these “cannot be raised fully out of the area at risk once climate change factors are taken into consideration”, so during “surface water flood events… the proposed electrical infrastructure could be expected to flood”.

The risk assessment recommends the garage should have a flood management plan, “to protect the proposed infrastructure and ensure staff are able to safely shut down the site before evacuating themselves”.

Comments on the application, numbered 220960, can be made until October 25.