Shine goes off rush for big solar farms in Shropshire
Applications for large-scale solar farms in the Shropshire countryside are set to see a marked decrease as government subsidies end next week.
On March 31 the government will end its subsidy scheme for ground-mounted solar farms larger than 5MW in capacity.
Anti-solar farm campaigners in the county have welcomed what they say should be the end of a rush to get plans in for sites across the county.
But green campaigners are "disappointed and depressed" with the government's actions, saying green energy investors just "won't bother" with Shropshire.
In the past couple of years Shropshire Council planners have been bombarded with a series of medium-to-large-scale planning applications for solar parks in the countryside.
The first multi-million pound solar farm given permission was at Hayford Farm, near Westbury, in 2013. Others given the go-ahead since include sites at Wheat Leasows, Hadley, Telford; Green Farm, Condover, near Shrewsbury; Twemlows Stud Farm, near Whitchurch and Burlton, near Wem.
But in the south of the county solar farms at Whitton, near Ludlow; Acton Scott, near Church Stretton; Tasley, near Bridgnorth and Neen Sollars, near Cleobury Mortimer, have all been turned down either by planning officers or Shropshire Council's south planning committee.
Peter van Duijvenvoorde, chairman of the Save South Shropshire Hills campaign group, said he welcomed the ending of subsidies for such sites under the government's Renewable Obligation Certificate scheme.
He said: "It means, I hope, we won't have this unseemly rush to get in applications anymore, and for these large scale solar farm companies it means they will have missed the boat."
He said, however, that some plans, such as those at Neen Sollars turned down this month, were just under the 5MW threshold so would have still had subsidy until 2017 if they had been given permission.
But Jamie Wrench of Shropshire green group Stretton Climate Care said he was "disappointed and depressed" with politicians making decisions for political reasons rather scientific or evidence-based ones, and the tendency to promise generous subsidies for green schemes only to pull the plug later.
