OT - one to bring TNP to the boil

[David.WE.Roberts]

"The council has received applications for a 62-acre scheme with 47,500 free-standing solar panels at Stratton Hall, alongside the A14 between Kirton and Levington, a 127-acre development with 100,000 panels at Hacheston, and 74 acres with 64,200 panels at Great Glemham."

As has been said many times before - not much use when it is cold and dark (like now).

"The development control committee will meet on Wednesday, January 23 to decide the schemes ? which would provide electricity from the sun for around 13,000 homes ? and is being recommended to give the go-ahead for all three projects."

So 211,700 panels to supply 13,000 homes.

Or roughly 16 panels per home, which is about the right number for a domestic installation.

Not sure, however, this is the best use of money or farmland.

Cheers

Dave R

[Broadback]

Never mind the farmland, let the peasants starve when there is no food, or of course import it from abroad , and what cost is that to global warming?

[rbel]

I cannot comment on the 'best use of money' aspect but as far as 'best use of farmland is concerned it depends very much on how productive the land is. From a quick look at Google maps it is clear that while much of the area is sound arable land under cultivation there are, at all three locations mentioned, areas of grassland that appears to be marginal to poor. If this is where the solar farms are to be located then fair enough (and the grassland could still be grazed in theory).

[Andy Burns]

Not much use at all when covered in snow, zero kWh for the past three days at one site I work at, the panels are all at about 15° slope therefore it doesn't slide off.

[Steve Firth]

Huge schemes similar to that are already in place down here in 'Ampshire.

Thus one rated at 5MW is ironically close to the Fawley oil fired power station.

will close this year, lose 1000MW of capacity, gain 5MW (part time).

There's a bigger one currently inching through planning permission:

[Dave Liquorice]

Grass doesn't grow very well in the shade. It grows a bit but would be very poor grazing.

[Dave Liquorice]

Neither.

We are paying for it by the levi on our electricity bills, money that goes into the pockets of the owners/shareholders of the private companies concerned.

Unless the land is very poor and unsuitable for farming. In that part of the world I find it hard to believe that there are two *large* contiguous patches of such land. It would better under the plough or cow.

[Dave Liquorice]

Only worry about global warming when you have food from abroad to import. When food gets in short supply countries *will* feed their own before exporting.

[rbel]

With the solar farms I have looked at there are 'lanes' between each row of arrays which can provide grazing, albeit somewhat limited, for sheep. Apart from anything else it is a practical method of keeping the grass 'mown' around the panels. The grazing in such locations will certainly be better than that available for sheep on upland grass.

[rbel]

It is difficult to comment without knowing the exact locations of the land in question, but as I indicated in my earlier post it appears to me that there are some areas of land in the places mentioned that to me (with experience of interpreting agricultural land use from VHR satellite images) to be marginal grass with little value except limited grazing or perhaps for agri-environment measures.

If the land under solar arrays is not grazed the SPS farming subsidy cannot be claimed on it which is very much an added incentive to put sheep on it.

The returns from the solar arrays would have to be really quite good to be better than the net income from planting cereal crops.

[dennis]

That is plainly untrue. you only have to look at the famines in Africa caused by the export of their basic food crops to the west to feed cattle. they wanted the cash to buy arms and booze.

[Steve Firth]

Bullshit.

[The Natural Philosopher]

I'll let you into a big secret. Grass doesn't grow under structures that totally block out the light.

That's why you don't find it growing in basements with no windows.

[The Natural Philosopher]

It doesn't grow AT ALL. Sheesh. Don't you guys ever walk through unmanaged woodland?

Almost NOTHING grows except toadstools, and the very few plants that can get up and strut their stuff before the spring leaves form. IN a coniferous wood NOTHING grows unless a tree falls over.

[The Natural Philosopher]

Er, no Dave. Unless they need the people to farm they will export, and let the people starve. Its called a banana republic.

[The Natural Philosopher]

er no. It would be more efficient not to have the lanes, but they need so much maintenance..

[Mike Tomlinson]

En el artículo , David.WE.Roberts escribió:

And only useful for the two days of the typical Brit "summer".

[harry]

Not at all, he's quite right. The leaders of these shit hole places don't give a toss about their own poor. The farm owners grow luxury crops for a lucrative export market.

[harry]

They can be maintained from beneath if the supports are high enough and so need no gaps. The panels can be removed from beneath too. How ever there are vertical gaps because the panels are inclined, but there is little light because they are on the North. If the supports are low, there needs to be maintenance lanes. The whole problem could be got around if they were mounted linearly on field boundaries.

[harry]

Where do you get that idea from?