Agenda item

That the individual opportunities identified in the Waterco Feasibility Study for ‘smart flood management’ in Mold are progressed to ‘Project Appraisal Report’ stage so that initial options identified are progressed and tested further in terms of their economic viability and therefore future deliverability through Welsh Government’s pipeline programme.

Councillor Bithell introduced a report on recent work led by the Council’s Flood & Coastal Erosion Risk Management (FCERM) team on a review of feasible options for designing and delivering a Mold Flood Alleviation Scheme.  Councils had been invited to submit details of large scale schemes for consideration by Welsh Government (WG) who were developing a five year national programme of FCERN schemes with allocated funding.  On behalf of the Council, a review of the previous unaffordable scheme in Mold had been undertaken by Waterco Consultants to explore alternative viable options.

The Service Manager Strategy explained that the consultants had been commissioned to identify ways of practically implementing the scheme and that the proposed approach was to agree a phased delivery programme of smaller component schemes.  The initial feasibility study had indicated a provisional total cost of £5.5m and the intention was to progress this to the next stage of a project appraisal report to provide more detail and testing.  Changes to the provision of grant funding meant that applications for eligible schemes could receive a contribution of between 75-85% from WG with the reminder to be funded from the Council’s capital programme.

The Project Engineer provided an overview of the various components of the scheme shown on the Opportunity Map, explaining that some areas were overlapping but that any could be delivered in isolation.  The project appraisal report would provide more technical data and refinement of costings for the WG to compare against another schemes in the region.

In response to questions from Councillors Bateman and Shotton, the Project Engineer provided information on attenuation storage tanks.  In respect of costs, the Manager explained that the £12m previous scheme had involved a significant amount of civil engineering work and the 4-staged approach for the new scheme could be more advantageous in attracting WG funding.

Following concerns by Councillor Owen Thomas on surrounding areas, the Project Engineer provided details of flood mitigation work by Natural Resources Wales and explained the aim of Option 7 in respect of areas south of Mold.  Planning requirements on future housing developments could provide an opportunity to achieve the desired infrastructure and would involve restrictions on run-off rates to ensure that these did not add to flooding problems.  Whilst the new scheme impacted less on landowners, some informal discussions had taken place and formal approaches would form part of the next stage.

The Chairman requested that officers look into his concerns about areas downstream such as Llong and Pontblyddyn and the impact of flow from other rivers as well as the Alyn.  The Manager said that ongoing work on the flood risk management plan would be brought back for consideration by the Committee.  The Project Engineer agreed to make enquiries with Natural Resources Wales on improvement works carried out in Pontblyddyn.

Councillor Bithell spoke about the various causes of historic flooding in Mold and commended the way forward set out in the report which would help to address other aspects.

RESOLVED:

That the individual opportunities identified in the Waterco Feasibility Study for ‘smart flood management’ in Mold are progressed to ‘Project Appraisal Report’ stage so that initial options identified are progressed and tested further in terms of their economic viability and therefore future deliverability through Welsh Government’s pipeline programme.