Anger over 'green' plans to harness energy from UK rivers
Anglers have attacked plans to build hundreds of "environmentally-friendly" water mills in British rivers.
By Jasper Copping
Last Updated: 1:30AM GMT 11 Jan 2009
The small-scale hydroelectric schemes, which are subsidised by energy customers, are being introduced to help reduce carbon emissions. Several of them use old water mills and weirs to produce power for homes. Around 500 schemes are already planned across the country.
However, fishermen have warned that they will deplete stocks, by destroying biodiversity on long stretches or waterways and blocking the movement of fish.
Mark Lloyd, chief executive of the Angling Trust, which will become Britain's largest fishing organisation when it is launched on Wednesday, said: "These schemes get big subsidies to make them economically viable, but we question whether the money is being spent in the right way. The amount of power these things generate is not that great and they cause big problems."
By diverting water from rivers to drive turbines, anglers say the schemes create "dried up" stretches of river, with less habitat for fish and for invertebrates – on which fish feed – while the structures also prevent the movement of migratory species like salmon, sea trout and eels, as well as other, coarse, species like shad, barbel, roach and chub that cover large stretches of waterways.
Mr Lloyd added: "We should be trying to remove barriers from our waterways, not finding new uses for them or creating new ones. Many of the proposals being put forward at the moment generate very small amounts of energy for the level of subsidy which they attract and the amount of damage they cause to fisheries and flow regimes in rivers. We don't want to see government subsidies being used up on such schemes."
He said "fish passes", which are designed to allow fish to move safely past the mills, had only limited benefits.
Schemes require planning permission from the local authority as well as approval from the Environment Agency. However, Mr Lloyd said the interests of anglers had been overlooked by the agency in the past.
"Fisheries' interests haven't been given the recognition they deserve, given the income they generate," he added.
The perceived lack of influence is one of the reasons behind the creation of the Angling Trust, which has been formed from six angling and conservation bodies.
Senior fishery figures at the Environment Agency also have significant reservations about the hydropower mills. One said that its schemes could be "hugely damaging".