NECA to stump up £16m for investment zone projects
North East Combined Authority’s cabinet will next week be asked to trigger further development at NETPark in County Durham and complete the funding package for Blyth’s Energy Central Institute.
At its meeting on 26 November, the NECA cabinet will hear a report on the progress of wave one projects within the North East Investment Zone programme.
The IZ builds on the ‘arc of innovation’ as envisaged in the North East devolution deal, and focuses on advanced manufacturing and green industries clusters at four intervention sites: Blyth Energy Central in Northumberland, the International Advanced Manufacturing Park straddling Sunderland and South Tyneside, the Tyne economic corridor (Newcastle, North Tyneside, and South Tyneside) and NETPark.
Under the terms of its devo deal, NECA will receive £55m over the first five years of the 10-year IZ programme, with the hope being that £160m investment will be levered in in total.
In July, cabinet approved funding to support the MADE NE project in Sunderland, which will strengthen the skills pipeline for the electric vehicle and batteries sector – Nissan and its supply chain being ahead of the game in advancing EV technology in the region.
Next on the table are the Blyth and Durham projects. Cabinet is asked to provide in-principle support to unlock the whole of NETPark phase 3a for future development, and accelerate the development of a first unit – expected to be 158,000 sq ft – in response to strong interest from potential inward investors.
Secondly, it is asked to rubber-stamp the completion of the funding package for Energy Central Institute, a new 28,245 sq ft higher education research and innovation facility in Blyth town centre, a project out to public consultation until 21 November.
The ECI project falls under the £95m Energising Blyth regeneration umbrella, a set of projects to revivify the town largely based on building up the renewable energy sector. The institute is seen as a natural next step for users of the learning hub already cleared at the Quayside.
NECA’s cabinet is asked to sign off on £11.25m for NETPark, and £5.5m for Blyth.
NETPark phase 3a
IZ funding would deliver essential infrastructure works consisting of grid connections, road infrastructure, levelling, stabilising and other groundworks to unlock phase 3a at NETPark and accelerate development of a commercial building on Zone 1, the report said.
Without proactive public sector investment to unlock the site, a major inward investment opportunity would be lost from the region, officers said, in addition to the regional supply chain opportunities that could be unlocked.
The project would be led by Durham County Council’s Business Durham arm, which is in advanced stages of securing a construction partner for the Zone 1 site.
In itself, DCC has already invested £48m at NETPark, with contributions from NELEP and NECA, on Zones 2 and 3 within phase 3a, and has committed to further investment of £24m in the development of one of the three units on Zone 1, subject to gap funding for the infrastructure and enabling works being secured.
The investment would facilitate remediation of 548,000 sq ft of underdeveloped land and accelerate direct delivery of the first commercial building on Zone 1 for the “nationally significant” inward investor, with the creation of 158,258 sq ft of commercial space.
The potential inward investment will create more than 250 highly skilled jobs, with an additional 500 jobs forecast to be created on the other two Zone 1 units unlocked by this investment, officers said.
You can read more on the North East’s investment zone programme and how tax sites and business rates retention policies work within them here.
