Warning that Cleobury Mortimer solar farm will 'give green light' to others

A 14,200 panel solar farm at High Point, Neen Sollars, near Cleobury Mortimer, is to go ahead despite being refused by Shropshire Council's south planning committee last year.

It is the second such solar farm refusal to be overturned on appeal by a London-based inspector.

It follows a similar case at Henley Bank, Acton Scott, where a permission for a solar farm was granted by an inspector in January, again in a U-turn from the Shropshire Council committee's decision.

Peter Van Duijvenvoorde, chair of campaign group Save South Shropshire Countryside, called the Neen Sollars decision "undemocratic" and said it was a worrying reversal of the trend to deny large solar farms on farmland in south Shropshire – which meant other landowners would now be encouraged to put in yet more applications for panels.

He said: "It's not very democratic. A couple of hundred people objected to it and just one person's opinion can outweigh that.

"It's a bit of a shock. It gives the green light to go ahead and put a solar farm application in for other land owners."

There have been five large solar farms refused in south Shropshire in the past 18 months, but now two of those have been given the go-ahead by planning inspectors and another two, in Whitton and Squirrel Lane, near Ludlow, are currently being considered on appeal.

Mr Van Duijvenvoorde said yet another potential solar farm site had re-emerged, at Rock Farm, next to the Squirrel Lane site, a year after interest in it was first shown.

Just this week council officers had told developers no environmental assessment was needed at Rock Farm, paving the way for an application to be made.

Until January, he said, it seemed decisions were going in the direction of objectors.

"But this is a bad development, it's worrying what's going on," he said.

Ludlow MP Philip Dunne said he was also "very disappointed" the Planning Inspectorate has pushed through the solar farm at Neen Sollars, against the view of Shropshire Council and residents."

Planning inspector Brian Cook said he allowed the appeal as there were few publicly available views the planned solar farm would be seen from, and its impact would be "limited".

Developer TGC Renewables said the scheme is expected to provide power for up to 1,165 homes and save about 54,000 tonnes of CO2 emissions over its lifetime.

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