Ty Gwyn
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10 years ago
Big news on Radio Wales today,the company proceeding to build the Swansea Bay Tidal Lagoon,has acquired a quarry in Cornwall to supply stone for this project and possibly 5 others as well.
A local engineer who had worked on break waters estimated the amount of stone needed for the Swansea project to be in the region of 200,000,000 tons,without the other projects,

Anyone know of this quarries location.?
RRX
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10 years ago
http://www.westernmorningnews.co.uk/Superquarry-industrialise-rural-corner-Cornwall/story-26090295-detail/story.html 

That would be this one, got the local 2nd home owners very upset
www.carbisbaycrew.co.uk Cornwall's Underground Site
Tony Blair
10 years ago
It will never happen. Cornwall is a museum and leisure venue for tourists.....and wildlife.

There is a special sort of spotted grasshopper around there protected by EU law.
Roy Morton
10 years ago
I can see them getting permission to work the quarry but only if the stone is taken away by sea. There is absolutely no chance whatsoever of road transport being an option. The cost would be prohibitive. Any talk of using the roads is purely to panic the locals into allowing the sea option and new jetties.
One of the main problems the previous company had was rough sea throwing boulder up onto the beach where the ships came in to load. A lot of time was wasted every year hiring diving teams to go down to clear up the mess. A new jetty would alleviate that problem but would also need to be built pretty strong to stand up to the battering it would take.
Dean did produce some nice samples of Natrolite and Analcite along with other Zeolites; maybe a few more samples may escape into the hands of local collectors rather than be dumped into the sea at Swansea.
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polo
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10 years ago
"Roy Morton" wrote:

I can see them getting permission to work the quarry but only if the stone is taken away by sea. There is absolutely no chance whatsoever of road transport being an option. The cost would be prohibitive. Any talk of using the roads is purely to panic the locals into allowing the sea option and new jetties.



The extant planning permission allows the quarry to be worked with the stone transported by sea (condition 5) and transported by road (condition 10).
Graigfawr
10 years ago
Few quarries are set up (or have the correct geology) to produce large size rock armour and coastal defence material: its a specialist product for a specialist and intermittent market.

When the A55 expressway was built along the north Wales coast in the 1980s, most of the large armour came from Norway as most of the more local quarries either had inappropriate geology (e.g. joints too closely spaced to permit really large blocks to be consistently produced) or were not set up to produce such large products and simply declined to tender.

With a clutch of similar lagoon projects proposed for the region, it would make sense for the developer to acquire their own sources of stone.

Up-thread a total requirement of 200mt was mentioned for the Swansea lagoon. The initial scoping documents in 2012 proposed a 9.5km long impoundment barrier. Combining these figures suggests 2,100 tons per linear metre on average. Granite is 2.65 tons/m3. This suggests an average cross-section of the barrier of 800m3 (it'll vary considerably along its length depending on water and sediment depth) which seems in the right ball-park for a say 20m wide top, with say 30 deg. side-slopes, in the relatively shallow water of Swansea Bay which however has deep soft sediments.

The articles linked-to up-thread state that proposals are for Dean Quarry to produce 1.2mt a year. Comparing this to the suggested 200mt required for the Swansea lagoon alone, suggests that the greater proportion of stone will be sourced from elsewhere for the clutch of proposed lagoons.

Glensanda lists armour among its products; it might be also be a viable supplier; its stated capacity is "in excess of 9 million tons" according to its website but this includes servicing existing customers - though these are presumably reduced at present due to the downturn. I seem to recall some Northern Irish quarries were in the armour market also. There are presumably some other UK quarries that can also supply this class of material. Nevertheless, if a clutch of lagoons proceed more or less simultaneously then the total amount of stone needed seems likely to necessitate a significant proportion being imported.

The Swansea lagoon may have, I would guess, around a four or five year construction period - the developers will wish to see it completed and generating income as soon as possible. Within this, the period during which rock is emplaced will probably be no more than two or three seasons (winter weather will limit both working on site as well as transport). Working from the figures up-thread, this suggests deliveries of 60 to 100mt a year - double handling will be avoided so there will be no stockpiling; rock will be dumped directly in it final position. Delivery and emplacement of rock in the high tidal range of the Bristol Channel may be a significant limiting factor in the construction schedule.

If the Swansea lagoon is a financial success then construction the other lagoons will follow, with elements of the construction overlapping. Potentially more than one lagoon may be constructed simultaneously. I haven't looked at their various sizes but if their rock requirements are broadly similar to the Swansea one, then in around a decade's time we may be seeing significantly more than 100mt of rock a year being needed. Sourcing and delivering such amounts in short time scales may be challenging, especially if by that time an economic upturn has occurred and there are other demands for stone, especially armour.

Overall, Dean Quarry's contribution to the proposed lagoons looks likely to be modest in proportion to the total amounts of stone needed, even if Dean's production rises to a figure somewhat above the 1.2mt a year currently talked about.

OS maps don't suggest enormous scope for expansion at Dean - it is difficult to visualise a full-size coastal super-quarry there. Perhaps it may develop into a 1-2mt a year quarry for a decade or two whilst the Bristol Channel lagoons are being constructed.
Roy Morton
10 years ago
Historicaly, Dean did use road transport for small loads for local use and I believe that there were limits on the size, tonnages and number of loads per day. The road to the quarry is barely wide enough to accomodate a standard tipper, and the cost from Dean to Swansea would be silly for loads even up to 22yards. Best option is by sea even with the daunting prospect of 'rounding the cape'
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Northerner
10 years ago
About 5 million tonnes is required for the Swansea tidal lagoon - not 200 million tonnes.

Around half of this is proposed to be sourced at Dean Quarry.

http://www.deanquarry.com/Presentations%20from%20the%20Public%20Meeting%2030th%20January.pdf 
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