Nuclear power operators at Sizewell have been urged to get together to minimise the amount of “protected” land to be sacrificed for the proposed C station.

EDF Energy is currently planning to relocate a range of Sizewell B buildings and a car park – in the way of the C station development – on to local woodland and a field, both within the designated Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONB).

However, David Bailey, a member of Leiston Town Council, told the latest meeting of the Sizewell Stakeholder Group (SSG) that the demolition of redundant A station buildings could free up land to minimise or avoid a further intrusion into the local countryside.

“We are concerned about the shear amount of land to be developed to make way for Sizewell C,” he said.

Mr Bailey said buildings at the southern end of the Sizewell A site had been cleared of all hazards, including asbestos, and were awaiting demolition.

However, Peter Montague, Sizewell A closure director for Magnox Limited, said funding for the demolition of those buildings was not scheduled to be available until 2021.

The cost would be “tens of millions of pounds”, he said.

During the past year £21 million has been spent on decommissioning Sizewell A, mostly on reducing radiation and asbestos hazards.

“Funding for all decommissioning work is phased and is made available first where there are specific risks to eliminate,” Mr Montague said.

He assured SSG members that the two companies involved in the Sizewell site were engaged in a dialogue aimed at minimising further development in the adjacent countryside.

Marianne Fellowes, SSG chair, said: “Local residents will expect land on the existing nuclear site to be used rather than AONB land.”

Joan Girling, a former Suffolk county councillor for Leiston, said it would not be acceptable to relocate the Sizewell visitor centre in the middle of Coronation Wood – planted to mark the coronation of George V – or in adjacent Pill Box Field.

Proposals to clear the wood – planted by the Ogilvie family in 1911 and partly felled to make way for the Sizewell A power station in the late 1950s – were revealed in a “scoping report” sent by EDF Energy to Suffolk Coastal council.