The local Agenda 21 took a clear position early on in the ongoing construction management process in the Pullach municipality regarding the controversial conversion and expansion plans for the United Initiators (UI) chemical plant. “It’s about nothing less than a piece of Pullach’s local development in the direction of an industrial location,” says a current statement by agenda spokesman Peter Kloeber, the mayor Susanna Millennium (Greens) and the members of the municipal council before they received it this Tuesday, February 22nd, will meet again on the subject. The decision to initiate the procedure for renewed public display and the approval of the new planning status is to be decided. Even before the meeting, the board and the town hall knew that this new planning status was not satisfactory for the agenda team either. And this despite the fact that the administration follows the agenda in one point and proposes to the municipal council to leave one of the two planned industrial areas on the UI site as a commercial area.
That’s clearly not enough for Peter Kloeber. He speaks of only minor changes and of the fact that none of the concerns listed in seven application points on the agenda have been resolved. On the contrary, others have been added, for example against the planned exceptions for 40-metre-high process plants and for another 84-metre-high exhaust air chimney next to the existing one near the Isar high bank. On this point, the head of the town hall,explainsexplains that it is only an inventory update for theexisting chimney and each additional one would have to be approved individually. No further chimneys are planned, “what is planned is an optimization of the storage capacities,” explains Stephan Heller, managing director of the advertising and communications agency Heller and Partners, which does public relations for UI.
Opponents expect production capacities of up to 136,000 tons
Christian Boeck, spokesman for the “Protection of the Isar Valley” association, does not want to believe these statements and speaks of a development plan that ensures “maximum industrial use down to the last corner” – at the expense of people’s health. According to the UI environmental report, around 4,000 tons of nitrogen oxides were released into the environment in 2019, and 8,000 tons in 2020. And with the current production volume of 60,000 tons of chemical products, according to Boeck, UI already has the calculated capacity for 136,000 tons according to the current approval situation. After the administrative court in Munich in November considered a citizens’ initiative initiated by him and his fellow campaigners against the UI plans to be inadmissible, Boeck is now hoping that the appeal against it at the Bavarian administrative court will be successful. A decision on this is still pending.
No increase in industrially usable areas, limitation of production quantities and storage capacities, no deforestation, limitation of cooling water extraction from hillside sources, conversion to green electricity and an increasing shift of dangerous goods transport from road to rail – these are the main demands of the agenda team, over which the municipal council has to decide – “but actually can’t,” as Kloeber says. The reason for this is the fact that all these points are regulated in an urban development contract with the company, which is still in progress. Details would not be given until the end. “How is a local council supposed to make decisions if they don’t even know what’s in the contract,” says the agenda man. At the moment, negotiations are still in progress and as long as they have not been concluded, she will not go into any details either, says Mayor Thousandfriend. “But we’re on the right track.” Stephan Heller confirms this: “All points have been dealt with well overall. We are not far apart anymore, only editorial details still need to be clarified.”
The new planning status, which the municipal council is to approve on Tuesday, also includes the determination of a 2,000 square meter area on the commercial area for an “Energy Center Pullach South”. According to the draft resolution, bundling effects, for example through the geothermal company IEP, from the district heating network and the supply of heat and cold from renewable energies should be used here.