'Give community their say on substation' amid fears of impact on environment

POLITICAL leaders want a community liaison group to be launched to work alongside project managers for a planned electricity substation south of Carmarthen, to ensure the project does not heavily impact the surrounding area.

- IAN LEWIS

National Grid Electricity Transmission (NGET) is developing plans to build a new 400kV electricity substation on land off the A484, near Llandyfaelog.

The proposed substation is in response to connection requests NGET has received from National Grid Electricity Distribution (NGED) and Green GEN Cymru.

Green GEN Cymru is behind two schemes which could see pylons placed over swathes of West Wales countryside one for its Towy Usk scheme, from the proposed Nant Mithil windfarm site in the Radnor Forest, down the Towy Valley; and a second Teifi Towy scheme which would link the Lan Fawr Energy Park proposed by Bute Energy, located east of Llanddewi Brefi and southeast of Tregaron.

Both Green GEN Cymru schemes would link to this proposed electricity substation near Llandyfaelog. NGET would own and maintain the proposed site and Green GEN Cymru will seek permission to build its own lower-voltage (132kV) substations next to the proposed NGET substation.

And NGED confirmed last year it is also planning to build its own 132kV substation at the same location, connecting to its own existing overhead lines via new underground cables.

That NGED substation will also connect directly to the NGET 400kV substation. Ultimately, if approved, the three substations could see 32 acres of farm fields swallowed up.