A Landsul compulsory acquisition judgment has upheld powers to take industrial land for the Cory carbon capture development consent order, while clarifying how far an affected owner must be heard during a nationally significant infrastructure examination.
Mr Justice Mould dismissed Landsul Limited’s challenge to the Cory Decarbonisation Project Order 2025 on 10 November 2026. The order authorises a carbon capture facility serving the Riverside 1 and Riverside 2 energy-from-waste stations at Belvedere in the London Borough of Bexley.
The Landsul compulsory acquisition judgment matters beyond this project because it addresses what makes land “required” under section 122 of the Planning Act 2008, the compelling public-interest test, proportionality and the procedural rights attached to a compulsory acquisition hearing.
Why the Landsul compulsory acquisition judgment matters
Landsul owns 7,838 square metres of hardstanding, buildings and shrubbery within the order land. Munster Joinery occupies the site as an industrial and distribution warehouse for its UK operations, employing 67 people. Landsul also has planning permission for further warehouse development.
Cory’s development consent order includes powers to acquire the site for supporting plant within the carbon capture scheme. The project is designed to capture at least 95 per cent of carbon dioxide emissions from the two Riverside generating stations.
Landsul and Munster objected during the examination. Their central case was that the plant could be arranged without taking their land. Landsul instructed a specialist consultant who produced alternative layouts and maintained that a technically feasible scheme could fit within the order while avoiding the disputed plot.
The legal challenge therefore raised a practical question which recurs in major infrastructure cases: does a promoter establish that land is required merely by showing it forms part of the preferred indicative design, particularly where an objector has produced a workable alternative?
An indicative layout can be relevant evidence
Section 122 of the Planning Act 2008 permits compulsory acquisition only where the land is required for the authorised development, required to facilitate or incidental to it, or provided as replacement land. The Secretary of State must also be satisfied that there is a compelling case in the public interest.
Landsul argued that the examining authority had asked whether the land was needed for Cory’s particular indicative layout rather than whether it was needed for the development authorised by the order. Mould J rejected that criticism on the facts.
An indicative layout can provide evidence of the land reasonably required for the authorised works. A competing layout can also be relevant, but neither is automatically decisive. The examining authority had considered the alternatives, the criticisms of Cory’s design and the operational case for keeping the plant on a contiguous site.
The Landsul compulsory acquisition judgment found that the examining authority was entitled to accept that requirement. Technical feasibility did not mean Landsul’s non-contiguous arrangement had to be preferred. The judgment distinguishes a possible alternative from an alternative which the decision-maker must treat as displacing the promoter’s scheme.
Electricity and heat infrastructure survived scrutiny
Two elements of the project were particularly important. Landsul said a smaller electricity substation could reduce the area required. It also questioned the need to reserve land for a heat transfer station when there was no existing network, confirmed customer or settled commercial demand.
The examining authority was entitled to consider delivery rather than theoretical possibility alone. Cory proposed a 132 kV substation and regarded a lower-voltage arrangement as uncertain and operationally difficult. The alternative evidence itself acknowledged that more work would be needed to investigate feasibility.
National and local policy also supported future heat networks. The authority could therefore conclude that a heat transfer station served a realistic, policy-backed purpose even though connections and demand were not yet guaranteed.
The Cory Decarbonisation Project Order 2025 records the authorised development and compulsory acquisition framework. Planning Geek’s guide to national policy statements for nationally significant infrastructure projects explains how national energy policy feeds into this form of decision-making.
Compelling public interest and proportionality
The Landsul compulsory acquisition judgment also rejected a challenge based on article 1 of the First Protocol to the European Convention on Human Rights. The court made its own proportionality assessment while giving considerable weight to the informed findings produced by the examination.
Assembling land reasonably required for the carbon capture scheme was a legitimate purpose. The judge considered the effect on Landsul and Munster, the public benefits of the project, the operational disadvantages of excluding the land and the availability of statutory compensation.
Compulsory acquisition did not have to be absolutely indispensable. The question was whether it was reasonably necessary in the circumstances and struck a fair balance. On the evidence accepted by the examining authority, excluding the land would have compromised the proposed layout, operational contiguity and timely delivery. The court held that the order satisfied the proportionality test.
What a compulsory acquisition hearing must provide
The most useful procedural part of the Landsul compulsory acquisition judgment concerns section 92 hearings. An affected landowner who requests a compulsory acquisition hearing is entitled to address the whole of the objection, not simply a selection of issues chosen by the examining authority.
Mould J identified two practical requirements. First, the owner must have a proper opportunity to make oral representations on the key contentions supporting the objection. Second, the owner must know the promoter’s key responses so the oral case can be presented on an informed basis.
That does not create a right to another hearing whenever later written evidence appears. The development consent examination is primarily written, iterative and subject to a statutory timetable. A further hearing may be required where the essential opportunity has not been provided, but it is not a mechanism for addressing every subsequent document orally.
In this case, Landsul had been able to address electricity infrastructure, site layout, operational contiguity and the proposed heat transfer station at the second compulsory acquisition hearing. Cory’s position on those issues had also been made clear. The parties later submitted more technical material, but their key cases did not materially change.
No general right to cross-examine
Landsul also argued that fairness and article 6 required cross-examination of Cory’s witnesses. The court disagreed. Mould J said: The procedure is deliberately inquisitorial.
Under section 94 and the examination rules, questioning is normally led by the examining authority. Another party may be allowed to question a witness where that is needed to test representations adequately or provide a fair chance to put its case, but cross-examination is not a general entitlement.
The court also rejected the suggestion that Cory’s technical evidence should be treated as unreliable because its witnesses had not complied with the expert-report formalities used in ordinary civil proceedings. Those requirements do not govern a Planning Act examination. The examining authority could assess each contribution for adequacy and persuasiveness.
Practical lessons for promoters and landowners
For promoters, the Landsul compulsory acquisition judgment supports the use of an indicative layout as part of the evidence that land is required, provided the examination addresses alternatives and the operational reasons for the proposed arrangement. A bare preference or convenient land assembly will not substitute for the statutory tests.
For landowners, an alternative design remains important evidence, but it needs to engage with delivery, operations, policy and the authorised development rather than establish technical possibility alone. Requests for a further hearing should identify precisely what key contention could not previously be addressed and why written submissions cannot cure the problem.
The judgment also reinforces the difference between a conventional adversarial inquiry and the nationally significant infrastructure examination. Planning Geek’s guide to what happens when planning permission is challenged explains the wider distinction between public-law review and a fresh decision on the planning merits.
The full case analysis is in Planning Geek’s Case Law entry for Landsul Limited v Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero [2026] EWHC 2887 (Admin). The claim was dismissed, leaving the compulsory acquisition powers in the Cory order intact.
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