Devon’s Solar Spread – June 2023
As yet another industrial scale solar farm is permitted in Devon – this time at Whimple, East Devon, we have put together a map showing all solar farms across the county with a minimum size of 20 acres. There are now 65 approved or in the pipeline. The 9 largest, covering 100+ acres, are all within the local authority areas of Torridge, North Devon, Mid Devon and East Devon.
The publication of our solar farm map comes as the national charity, CPRE, launches its own campaign for solar to be located on rooftops, something we as the Devon branch have long campaigned for. But as our map shows, these arguments fall on deaf ears because solar farm developers have deeper pockets than our charity and are able to promote their agenda and interests and claim that covering our green fields in glass panels, metal and batteries is the answer to our energy crisis. It’s not.
In a wet climate like Devon’s covering thousands of acres of productive pasture with glass is not the ‘green’ solution it’s claimed to be, especially when there are plenty of redundant brownfield sites and rooftops where panels could be put.
Our campaign mottos are ‘Grass not Glass’ and ‘Farm for Food’ and we will continue to try to protect our precious farmland and countryside from these inappropriate schemes.
