“ENOUGH is enough.”

That was the message from hundreds of campaigners who turned out in force to protest against a major Hampshire energy plant development.

More than 200 people gathered outside Marchwood Village Hall to protest against plans for a £9.8m anaerobic digestion plant between Marchwood and Eling.

Some residents claimed the development would be the final straw and that they were fed up with the village being a “dumping ground” in recent years for industrial facilities.

And protesters say they will not give up without a fight to the bitter end.

Carrying placards with slogans like ‘Marchwood says no’, ‘We say no to Cork’s farm development’ and ‘Enough is enough’, residents also chanted ‘Marchwood says no’ to a series of questions given on a loudspeaker.

Barker-Mills Estates (BME) has angered locals with its plans to redevelop land at Cork’s Farm and they have formed the Marchwood Against Anaerobic Digestion (MAAD) in response.

The plans have been on show at the village hall for two days and attracted more than 730 visitors.

The building would use food waste from schools, supermarkets and restaurants to create enough renewable energy to power 2,000 homes.

A small business park is also due to be built on the 30-acre site.

The exhibition stated the digestion plant would create 12 jobs alongside using local trades and services during construction and operation, with a further 250 jobs at the business park.

In tandem with the two-day exhibition, campaigners ran a petition against the proposal outside the village hall which attracted around 800 signatures, with a further 500 signing an online petition in the last week.

Residents at the protest raised concerns about additional traffic on already congested roads, the smell and safety of the gases it would produce, that Marchwood was already overloaded with industrial facilities in the area like the sewage works and power station and questioned the use of a Greenfield site.

Marchwood resident of 20 years, Ged Baren, 59, raised concern about the odours produced and the safety of such sites.

Daily Echo:

He added: “We’re the waste capital of Hampshire at the moment.

“We’re going to be Dibley village in the middle of an industrial estate stretching from Fawley to Totton.

“We haven’t got the infrastructure to maintain it.”

Mike Collingwood, who led the MAAD protest, said: “It’s to raise awareness to the whole village of what the problems are going to be.

Everyone’s going to be impacted.”

BME has confirmed the proposals would generate more than 400 vehicle movements a day but stress road improvements were planned.

The firm also says that modern anaerobic digestion plants do not have the same potential to produce odour as older facilities.

It added that it would work to ensure allotments, a green garden, orchards and footpaths were provided for local people and would also be listening to any feedback as it developed the proposals.