Shoreham Harbour is bidding for eco-town status in an attempt to rejuvenate its harbour.

Council chiefs have been trying to find funding for an ambitious regeneration project for some years.

Today, housing minister John Healey announced it was one of nine areas bidding to become part of the second wave of eco-towns which could benefit from £10m in funding.

Under this scheme, proposals for sustainable developments need to include 5,000 homes and demonstrate innovative ideas for how jobs, schools and services are delivered in low carbon ways that will help in the UK respond to climate change.

Possible second wave bids are still at an early stage and will be subject to further, widespread consultation on proposals, before public consultation and local planning approval.

Housing and Planning Minister, John Healey, said: “This signals real and radical momentum to change and to re-think how we design our towns and homes for the future.

“We must push for international change at Copenhagen, but also act locally here in Britain too.

“They have recognised that eco-towns in the future will not be exceptional and the standards we are setting now will spread like an eco-echo for all new development. “ Earlier this month, Brighton and Hove City Council, Adur District Council and West Sussex County Council formed a committee, together with the Shoreham Port Authority, to create a new project out of the ashes of an original scheme for 10,000 homes.

In July, quangos the Homes and Communities Agency and Seeda pulled funding for the Joint Area Action Plan (JAAP) – a planning blueprint for the area - because of budget cuts.

This is not the first time Shoreham Harbour has attempted to become an eco-town. It first submitted a bid in 2007, but this was not successful.

Its latest eco-town bid is an update of existing plans. It says its scheme could contain about 5,000 homes and “a similar level of jobs”.

If it is given funding, some of the money would be spent on working out how to make water provision, waste disposal and energey generation more sustainable.

The Government warned that reheated or ‘greenwashed’ proposals will not make it through the planning process.

But it added that all locations have submitted promising ideas so far for meeting these standards.

The second wave of eco towns are in addition to the four sites announced in July, which met tough government standards. Those sites in Hampshire, Norfolk, Cornwall and Oxfordshire are currently developing revolutionary “masterplans” for local planning approval. Whitehill-Bordon in Hampshire was the first to publish its draft masterplan for public consultation last month.