GREEN energy could one day power a village near York, after a local councillor came up with a plan to use a weir on the River Derwent to produce electricity.

Sutton Upon Derwent parish councillor Peter Kirby hit upon the idea of using a water turbine or a similar device on the weir to generate electricity as the council discussed the problem of frequent power cuts in the village.

There is both a man-made weir, which is about 40ft wide and ten to 15ft high, and a lock on the River Derwent at the Elvington and Sutton Upon Derwent border, created to help with navigation and flooding. There is also a disused 18th century water mill which went out of use in 1960.

The Environment Agency controls the weir and the top lock, and the council has already written to them with its suggestion. The bottom lock is operated by Yorkshire Wildlife Trust.

Parish council vice-chairman Chris Wise said: "The Environment Agency sent us back a document and we are doing more research using this. We are very keen to see if this can be a viable energy source.

"We get power cuts regularly, maybe a dozen times a week for one or two minutes. This could be something that might help with that."

Coun Wise said they were keen to see if they old mill could be part of the scheme and if the power generated could be sold to a supplier to generate extra cash for the village.

An Environment Agency spokesperson said: "Generating electricity from a water source is a very complicated process and we would look at the feasibility of each case. We would have to look at conservation and impact on fisheries before any decision could be made."

Katie Elliott, of the Friends of the Earth climate team, said the environment group would "really welcome" using the weir as a green power source and congratulated the parish council for coming up with the idea.

"We really encourage creative thinking and effective use of energy," she said.

"I think it is great that the villagers have come up with this suggestion and hopefully it will have the support that it needs to get it off the ground."

Eurwen Thomas, of the renewable energy sector of the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI), said any application to use the weir would need to be approved by the DTI. But similar schemes involving water mills had been successful in South Wales.

She said: "We want to promote all viable forms of renewable energy and would welcome this idea to help achieve our targets of using ten per cent renewable energy by 2010"

Updated: 10:31 Wednesday, October 20, 2004