Norwich Energy Innovation Park

Goff Group, together with their advisers and project architects, have been consulting with key stakeholders, including South Norfolk District Council and Norfolk County Council to develop a scheme that responds positively to local environmental constraints and opportunities.

Goff is proposing to submit a full planning application for the Energy Innovation Park towards the end of October. We wish to hear the views of the local community and other stakeholders on the draft proposals before we finalise our plans.

This web consultation has been designed to provide you with information on the draft proposals and to request your feedback.

What is an Energy Innovation Park?

The Energy Innovation Park will provide workshops, incubation units, flexible grow on units and associated offices focussed on attracting businesses involved in the research and development of renewable energy technologies and related products.  There will be no large-scale energy generation on site.  The building will be designed to meet the highest standards of sustainability (BREEAM Outstanding) providing an exemplar facility to attract innovative businesses.  The building will also provide a café and flexible break out areas for staff. Car parking and service yards will be provided and the site will be accessed via a new entrance onto Stanfield Road.

The aim is for this centre to be:

• An exemplar of one of the UK’s leading business enterprise parks, being a developer of renewable and low carbon energy and a significant producer of low carbon goods and services. It will encourage and support the creation of high value digital/engineering start-ups and create grow- on space for evolving businesses.
• A tangible testbed for innovation in industries such as digital, automotive, farming and food production, transportation and modular construction which need to reduce their carbon footprint and adapt to a changing climate.
• An example of a development with a high quality natural environment and natural resources which are vulnerable to climate change but where innovative mitigation measures and technologies have been pioneered to add to the sustainable narrative.
• An area with a wealth of world-class innovation and thinking, and exportable skills along with many award-winning businesses that are on the leading edge of a low carbon future adding to Hethel Innovation’s success.
• The Park will provide flexible and clean space in a low carbon environment, ideally offering start-up or grow-on space for businesses responding to a post-COVID19 reality.
• This will be “the place where high growth businesses with aspirations choose to be,” “well connected” and at the heart of “a high performing productive economy’ and “a centre for the UK’s clean energy sector.” Norwich Energy & Innovation Park will be “a place with a clear ambitious offer to the world.”

Established in 1888, Goff Group is a family owned and managed heating oil distributor, serving more than 70,000 homes, farms, schools, and businesses across East Anglia and the South East.

Since the early 2000s, the Goff headquarters has been located at the former BP site at Stanfield Road, Wymondham. From there, Goff have continued to expand south and west and now employs 120 staff, operating from 8 depots, including tankers based in a refinery and a major import terminal. Today Goff is proud to still be an independent family business that is recognised as one of the top 5 distributors in the UK.

The company directors have undertaken a strategic review of the Goff Group future business strategy and have identified a clear need to develop and diversify away from oil distribution in order to create a long term viable future business.

With this in mind, Goff have taken the decision to proactively invest in helping the development of low carbon technologies to replace oil in the longer term. The company want to be at the forefront of this developing market in order to secure the future of the business and its staff. This proposal is, therefore, fundamental to the success of the company’s future low carbon business strategy.

An area of 5ha has been surveyed to ensure that the development is best located within the available land.  The application site itself may be slightly smaller.  The land comprises open scrub and semi-improved grassland situated between the hamlets of Browick and Silfield. It is bounded by Stanfield Road to the north, Goff Petroleum to the east, and a mixture of open countryside and agricultural land to the south and west. The site has a gently sloping southerly aspect descending down to the River Tiffey, and is well contained for the majority by established field hedges and trees. 

Beyond the proposed site, to the north is Wiffen’s Farm and to the west the A11 Wymondham Bypass. Generally, to the east and south are agricultural fields with residential properties beyond Burnthouse Lane, Silfield Street and Bridge Road.

Ecology

The site is located close to County Wildlife Sites at Breakers Yard, Silfield Newt Reserve and The Lizard to the south and west.  These include marshy grassland, fen, acid grassland, a disused railway embankment, broad-leaved woodland and gravel scrub. The River Tiffey runs east to west to the south of the site. Detailed ecological survey and assessment of the site and the impacts of the scheme is being carried out.  The application has been designed to minimise the loss of trees and hedgerows and will propose ecological mitigation and compensation where appropriate.

Heritage

There are a number of listed buildings within 500m of the site including Banhams Farm, Wiffens Farm to the north east and Silfield Mill and Lime Tree Farmhouse to the south. The latter two are within 500m of the southern site boundary but more than 500m from the proposed buildings. No significant heritage impacts are anticipated as a result of the proposals.

Flood Risk

The development site is not at risk of flooding from rivers but part of it is subject to surface water flooding according to Environment Agency flood mapping.  The scheme is being designed in consultation with the Lead Local Flood Authority to avoid these areas as far as possible and to provide mitigation if appropriate.

HSE (Health and Safety Executive) Consultation Zone

Part of the site is located within an HSE hazardous installation consultation zone due to the designation of the adjacent fuel terminal as a Lower Tier COMAH (Control of Major Accident Hazards Regulations 1999) site.  COMAH applies to establishments where quantities of dangerous substances are present, or likely to be present, in this case oil storage.

The Energy Innovation Park will provide:

• Up to 9,950 sqm gross development area containing workshops, incubation units, flexible grow on units, associated offices, café and break out space
• Of the gross area, up to 8,000 sqm will be lettable space
• Two storey buildings, maximum height will be 13m to the roof apex
• Photovoltaic solar panels to south facing roof surfaces
• Up to 250 space car park for the innovation park and vehicular circulation areas
• Up to 138 space replacement car park for the adjacent Goff Petroleum site
• A service yard with external storage space for containers
• Site landscaping
• A surface water attenuation pond
• Associated ecological compensation
• A new T-junction with a ghost island from Stanfield Road
• Low level lighting is likely to be required to car park and servicing areas

The design has been developed to create a state of the art, modern and sustainable facility, within a high quality landscape setting. The building form is generated by the optimum width to provide workshop and office spaces for which there is a proven demand, based on the success of the nearby Hethel Innovation Centre.

External materials will have low embodied energy, and low maintenance, and the structure will be timber, creating a highly sustainable building. All heating and hot water will be generated using air source heat pumps, and photovoltaic cells will provide additional electricity. We are aiming to get a BREEAM rating of Outstanding, and this will make the project only the second in Norfolk to achieve this level.

The brief has developed and evolved in response to the COVID-19 environment, and the accommodation has changed to create a larger number of workshops, and fewer offices, which we think best reflects the likely market demand in the post COVID-19 era. The offices will have a provision for flexible on-demand office space, which we think will become more attractive in the new business environment, which indicates a greater amount of home working as a business norm. The entrance to the building will comprise of a well designed and large flexible social space, which can used by employees and visitors to the building, and which will be available to the general public.

The existing setting is sensitive, and we have developed a landscape strategy, which provides good quality screening from Stanfield Road. There are opportunities to link to the wider environment using existing pathway networks which are in close proximity to the site.

The Norwich Energy Innovation Park is a unique proposal offering considerable social and economic benefits. The Norwich Energy Innovation Park will be funded and built out by Goff Group and managed in conjunction with Hethel Innovation Centre.

Unique Facility

The facility will meet a growing requirement for research and development space in the low carbon technology sector, providing bespoke facilities and incubation space, benefitting from being clustered together in order to drive forward innovation. No such dedicated facility exists in the UK and this proposal provides a unique opportunity for the new centre to become a national leader.

Helping to Combat Climate Change

The Energy Innovation Park will provide a sustainable low carbon building and quality working environment. It will create a hub for innovative clean energy businesses to locate and develop low carbon and renewable technologies and products.  This will help facilitate the move away from fossil fuels which is important to help combat climate change.

Job Creation

The project has the potential to provide hundreds of skilled jobs in this expanding sector whilst also supporting existing jobs at the neighbouring Goff site.

Strategic Position

The site is strategically located within the Cambridge-Norwich Tech Corridor, designated by the New Anglia LEP. This site provides an ideal opportunity to provide an exemplar scheme within the Tech Corridor and deliver on the vision for Greater Norwich set out in the draft Greater Norwich Local Plan, which aims to “support growth of a diverse low carbon economy which will compete globally through its world class knowledge-intensive jobs in the Cambridge-Norwich Tech Corridor”.

Links to Existing Goff Headquarters

Goff will retain ownership of the Energy Innovation Park, sharing management of it with Hethel Innovation Centre. The location adjoining the existing Goff Petroleum headquarters site enables the business to adapt to its strategic vision, physically demonstrating its commitment to a low carbon future. The new research facility will complement the Goff business through collaboration on projects and will also share fuel storage, other facilities and expertise where appropriate.

Meets Energy Sector Requirements

The design and construction of the Energy Innovation Park has taken on board the requirements of the HSE. The fact that the site already falls within a hazardous installation consultation zone, designated due to the neighbouring Goff Petroleum site housing large scale oil storage facilities, provides flexibility for energy sector businesses to locate here as it provides the ability for fuel storage, research and development that would not be possible at non-designated sites.

Complementary Uses

The proposal site is located within close proximity to Hethel Innovation Centre and Lotus Cars. Discussions are ongoing with Hethel Innovation, with beneficial opportunities available for collaboration and joint working and it is proposed that the two will be jointly managed. This will help create an economy of scale to offer lean, efficient, better value solutions and crucial grow-on space to hi-tech businesses wanting to be located near to Norwich and the A11 at the heart of the Cambridge-Norwich Tech Corridor.

Connectivity

The application site is favourably located near to a junction onto the A11.  Opportunities are being explored to improve walking and cycling connectivity from the site to Wymondham’s railway station and town centre.

Opportunities are also being explored to improve ecological connectivity between the neighbouring wildlife sites as part of the development proposals.

We hope that you support these draft development proposals and we would like to hear your views and thoughts on the scheme.

Please take the time to fill in a Feedback Form and email us at: reply@lanproservices.co.uk

Please make "Norwich Energy Innovation Park" or similar the email subject, so that we can identify your comments from this consultation as easily as possible, and respond if you have any direct questions for us or the applicant.

Alternatively, you can write to us at:

Norwich Energy Innovation Park, c/o Lanpro Services, Brettingham House, 98 Pottergate, Norwich, NR2 1EQ

Please note that this consultation closes on Monday 21 September, so please contact us before then.

We look forward to receiving your comments.

You will also have a further opportunity to comment on the plans directly to South Norfolk District Council once the application is submitted.