Councillor claims Wiltshire is 'dumping ground' for solar farms
Cllr Chris Brautigam isn't happy with discussions for a solar farm in Potterne, just weeks after an application for another was rejected
Wiltshire has become ‘a dumping ground for solar farms’ a disgruntled councillor told a meeting this week.
Just weeks after an application for a 70-acre solar farm at Potterne was rejected, Wiltshire Council’s strategic planning committee was discussing plans to build a 218-acre solar farm just a mile away.
The Potterne Park Farm site is between the villages of Potterne, Urchfont, and Easterton and just 1.5km from the One Tree Hill site, where councillors rejected plans for a solar farm on May 30.
Referring to the fact that Wiltshire Council had exceeded by 39 per cent its 2030 solar target of with 820 megawatt of solar capacity, Cllr Chris Brautigam (Southwick, Reform UK) told the committee “Wiltshire is a dumping ground for solar farms. We’ve already done our bit.”
Cllr Brautigam was not alone in opposing the scheme. The council’s own officers were recommending refusal on archaeological grounds.
Applicant Potterne Solar Project Limited had “failed to provide sufficient information to access the potential impact of the proposed development on archaeological assets within the site,” they said.
The site is 300 metres from a scheduled monument – the site of a medieval moated hunting lodge – along with a number of neolithic round barrows. The county’s archaeologist is keen to know what lies beneath the surface of the site before work commences.
Cllr Chris Newbury (Wylye Valley, Conservative) asked “So I assume if we do refuse this today on that one reason, then they go away and do the work, it comes back to us recommended for approval – is that right?”
“Absolutely,” the planning officers told him.
The meeting then heard representations for and against the proposal from members of the public.
Steve Holt of Potterne Solar Action Group – a local campaign group established to fight both solar farm applications – said: “We welcome the planning officer’s recommendation to refuse, but today we urge you to strengthen the reasons for that refusal.
“One month ago a refusal notice was issued for One Tree Hill. This is the same landscape, the same valley, and the same ecosystem. But this proposal is three times larger, and the impact will be even greater.”
The meeting also heard from Peter Grubb of Potterne Solar Project Limited, who said: “This proposal is for a clean energy generator brought forward at a time when fossil fuel power stations are being phased out, electricity demand is rising sharply, and international conflicts continue to leave us exposed to volatile gas prices.
“We’re also seeing extreme weather from climate change impacting farming and our health. This proposal clearly qualifies as a critical national priority.”
“The committee report… confirms that the proposal is fully acceptable on all planning grounds except for a single outstanding issue, that of trial trenching. I urge members to concentrate their attention on this specific point rather than letting it jeopardise a proposal that is otherwise described as acceptable and will bring huge benefits.”
The meeting also heard from farmer and landowner Philip Abbatt, who said: “I have lived on a farmed this land for 31 years. Crop prices are falling and costs are rising. Add to that the uncertainty brought by climate change with extreme drought and heavy rainfall disrupting growing seasons, adapting the farm business is essential.
“The stable income from the solar farm would underpin the survival of the business and allow the next generation to continue farming with confidence in a changing world.”
And ward councillor Dominic Munns (The Lavingtons, Conservative) posited: “Should the grounds for refusal be extended? In my view, yes.”
As the meeting hit the two-hour mark and a mandatory break was imposed, a broad consensus was formed that the grounds for refusal needed to be “beefed up”.
Councillors considered deferring a decision for a site visit – before being told that non-determination could lead to the application being decided by a planning inspector – and asked whether a technical ecology report from the One Tree Hill application could be used to strengthen refusal – it couldn’t.
Neither could the five public footpaths running across the site be used as a reason for refusal, as there was no suggestion that public access to the land would be hindered after construction.
Cllr Howard Greenman (Kington, Conservative) suggested borrowing a landscape reason for refusal from the One Tree Hill application, as they referred to the same landscape.
It read: “The proposed development would result in significant and unacceptable harm to the character, quality, and visual amenity of the local and wider landscape.
“The site is a valued landscape, including heritage value, located in a prominent position within a sensitive rural setting, forming part of the setting of a designated National Landscape.”
But Cllr Greenman was still unsure that the committee’s objections were strong enough.
“We seem to be going nowhere very quickly here,” said committee chairman Ernie Clark (Hilperton, Independent), conscious that councillors, officers, and members of the public had spent nearly two and a half hours in a council chamber with no air conditioning on the hottest day of the year.
Cllr Newbury alighted on the 2017 Potterne Neighbourhood Plan, which covers the south west part of the proposed site. The policy gives priority to agriculture and tourism and, argued Cllr Newbury, a solar farm would be “contrary to the plan” and “a third reason for refusal.”
The motion was carried and the application refused on the officer’s original reason, together with the two amendments.