Questions raised over whether Potash mine will go ahead

Questions raised over whether Potash mine will go ahead

Over the last few years we’ve been opposed to the world’s largest potash mine being built in the North York Moors National Park. Today, Sirius Minerals, the company responsible, announced its intention to open the mine in 5 years’ time. However, this latest announcement shows that the total cost of the project has increased significantly and there is a still a lot of work to do to raise the necessary finance. This raises serious questions about whether this project will ever go ahead.

Ruth Bradshaw, our policy and research manager said, “We remain convinced that it is completely inappropriate to have a development of this scale in a National Park, an area which is meant to have the highest level of planning protection. The promised economic benefits for the surrounding area do not justify the huge damage to the National Park’s landscape, wildlife and local tourism economy and today’s announcement raises big questions about whether those benefits will ever be delivered. It’s clear that there is still a very long way to go before the project can be implemented.”