FARMERS who installed a slurry-fed green energy unit without planning permission beside the Wye Valley Walk and a 12th Century chapel have been given retrospective planning permission.

Enforcement action was taken by Herefordshire Council planners against Nigel Green and Sally Morris-Green of Much Fawley Farm in Fawley, four miles north of Ross-on-Wye, and the duo then appealed to the planning inspector.

Having initially turned the scheme down in May 2020, the council has now given the green light to an amended plan with conditions, although the appeal action is still waiting to be resolved.

An anaerobic digester plant, along with another heat and power unit, was given planning permission in 2009 and was installed as a £2m investment in 2012 to produce green energy.

But a back-up combined heat and power unit was also located there in 2016 without planning permission, next to the couple’s 14th century Grade II-listed farmhouse.

Both units are powered by methane gas from crops and chicken slurry fed into the digester to provide electricity for the farm and National Grid.

Planners found about the second unapproved unit in a shipping container close to the Grade II-listed Much Fawley Chapel when they investigated complaints of noise at the Wyeside farm.

Neighbours complained that the unit ran 24 hours a day and caused a stink, prompting the council to take enforcement action after turning down the initial retrospective application.

However, an amended plan complete with a timber panel barrier to dampen noise and tree planting to integrate the unit into the local environment has now been given the go ahead.

A planning officer’s report said of the new scheme: "The proposal is associated with the existing established anaerobic digester plant on site and will ensure the continued uninterrupted operation of the plant.

"Environmental health officers are satisfied that the noise mitigation which has been put forward and assessed will ensure that the amenity of local residents in the surrounding area is safeguarded."

The report added that an emissions assessment showed there was no harm to the River Wye Special Area of Conservation, and the development would not cause an unacceptable impact on air quality.

A condition was also imposed that only one of the heat and power units could be in operation at one time without written permission.

The environmental health officer had previously said noise was ’distinctly audible’ at the nearby chapel while the smell was noticeable at neighbouring properties, although cattle manure is no longer used since the dairy herd was sold in 2020.

Sharon Francis, who lives 100 yards away, had claimed they were assailed by an "intolerable stench" when the digester broke down and told planners: "The generator is extremely noisy, so a restful night’s sleep is impossible."

Karen Birch added that the whole anaerobic digester operation caused "continual and major disruption to our lives with truly horrendous smells."