CHESHIRE residents have teamed up with Wrexham campaigners to protest against a proposed £800m power station.

People in Farndon, Malpas, Shocklach and Tilston have been called upon to support the Wrexham Residents Against Power Scheme (Wraps) action group.

Wrexham Power’s bid to create a gas-fired power station could create up to 1,200 construction jobs and 50 permanent posts on the proposed Wrexham Industrial Estate site.

One of the residents against the plan is farmer Edward Trevor-Barnston, of Farndon, who says the new power station is unnecessary and will send pollution fumes across Cheshire.

He said: “We are very much on the border between England and Wales, talking to friends and colleagues on the Cheshire side of the border, and there has been an overwhelming response of people not aware of the plan.

“We are only three miles east of the proposed site and it’s going to affect the local community and be a blight on the tourism industry, with chimneys 90m high, and there is effectively nothing between us and the pylons.

“It simply does not make any sense for it to be based here.”

A Wraps spokesman added: “While the UK needs more power, there is no genuine need for a scheme of this size in the Wrexham area. Wales already produces more power than it uses.

“There are better locations for such a development in the UK, such as the many recently closed nuclear, coal and oil plants which have pylons in place. The power station would be a huge eyesore in and around rural locations including the Cheshire/Shropshire approaches to Wrexham.”

A WPL spokesman said: “Wrexham Power Limited is continuing to prepare and assess detailed designs for the proposed Wrexham Energy Centre and its connections.

“However, considerable detailed and technical work is required to inform these designs and to make sure that we bring forward fully considered proposals for the people of Wrexham to consider and comment on before we submit an application.”

He said correspondence was being logged from locals to ‘inform the proposals’.

Information will be provided to the public at a formal consultation stage, including the power station design and an environmental impact assessment.

It will also include details of the gas and electricity connections and their routes.