Villagers ‘in shock’ after solar farm approved

Campaigners opposed to a 2,500-acre solar farm have said they are “in shock” after the energy secretary approved the plan.

The £600m Sunnica energy park on the Cambridgeshire-Suffolk border was given the green light on Friday.

Opponents say the scheme would take away some of the UK’s most productive land from use, while ignoring alternative sites such as south-facing commercial rooftops.

The Department of Energy Security and Net Zero says “the benefits of the proposed development outweigh its negative impacts.”

“We feel completely devastated”

Catherine Judkins, chair of the Say No to Sunnica action group, said villagers were “quite shocked”.

“What is really frustrating and why everyone is so angry is that this apparently ill-considered decision goes against the expert advice of the examiners (at the Planning Inspectorate).”

She said they had written a report that said “any potential benefits would not be outweighed by the harms.”

Second, she highlighted “the commitments made by the Labour Party throughout the election campaign that food security is a national security issue.”

“This land is capable of producing high-value crops,” she said.

Finally, solar is a “wonderful technology because it is very versatile.”

Ms Judkins said: “It can be installed on roofs, car parks, brownfield sites, we have landfill sites being covered, not to mention the UK has over 600,000 acres of south-facing commercial roofs.

“In Germany, 14 GW of solar power will be installed by 2023, of which almost 70% is distributed via rooftops. The speed and scale at which solar can be deployed is incredible.”

The decision on these plans has been delayed several times, most recently due to the UK general election.

New energy security secretary Ed Miliband said solar power was “crucial to achieving net zero emissions by 2030”.

He said some files had been “stuck for months before I arrived at the department” and that “I made the decision in three days.”

“We will take tough decisions with ambition and urgency – all part of our plan to make the UK a clean energy superpower,” he added.

It was opposed by Suffolk County Council, East Cambridgeshire District Council and former Conservative MPs Matt Hancock for West Suffolk and Lucy Fraser for Ely.

Where is the solar farm going?

Sunnica said its solar farm would power 172,000 homes and create 1,500 jobs during construction.

Its revised plans mean it will cover three sites linked by underground cables to each other and to the national grid at Burwell substation.

The sites are:

• Sunnica East Site A, near West Row and Mildenhall in Suffolk

• Sunnica East Site B, south of Worlington village, near Mildenhall

• Sunnica West Site A, near Newmarket north of the A14 in Cambridgeshire

It will create 27 full-time jobs and the land will be decontaminated at the end of the project’s lifespan and returned to its previous use.

“This decision has come as a bolt from the blue, so early in the term of this new government,” said Richard Radcliffe, chairman of Isleham Parish Council in Cambridgeshire.

“The very long landscape views… will all disappear (under) the solar panels which will take 15 years to be hidden by the hedges they will plant.”

Isabel Cross, who has lived in the area for 30 years, described it as “the industrialisation of the landscape”.

She was also concerned about the batteries needed to store the energy.

“They will be the largest in Europe and they will be present in all the villages,” she said.

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