\n Energy company, Bluefield Renewable Developments Ltd, applied for planning permission to build a solar farm and battery energy storage system, along with the necessary equipment and infrastructure, including a substation and underground cable.\n<\/p>\n
\n The applicant sought to build the development across several villages – Stow Longa, Catworth, Spaldwick, Kimbolton and Stonely.\n<\/p>\n
\n Huntingdonshire District Councillors on the Development Management Committee heard the plans at a meeting on July 21.\n<\/p>\n
\n Cllr James Matthews, a member of Stow Longa Parish Council, pleaded with the committee to refuse the plans.\n<\/p>\n
\n He said that the solar farm would be a “vast and inappropriate industrialisation of their countryside” and that there will be real harm to people living nearby.\n<\/p>\n
\n Cllr Jonathan Gray. (Image: Huntingdonshire District Council) Cllr Jonathan Gray, who represents several of the parishes at HDC, agreed that the plans are an industrialisation of the fields.\n<\/p>\n
\n The committee then heard from Jonathan Selwyn, who represented Bluefield at the meeting.\n<\/p>\n
\n He told members that solar energy is already making a “significant difference” across the UK and is providing up to 40 per cent of UK daytime electricity.\n<\/p>\n
\n When questioned by councillors over the amount of lighting at the site, and whether it would impact those living nearby, he said there would be no\u00a0“permanent lighting”, only emergency lighting.\n<\/p>\n
\n Cllr Patricia Jordan. (Image: Huntingdonshire District Council) Cllr Patricia Jordan asked Mr Selwyn whether public rights of way would be impacted by the development, to which he said that Bluefield are “committed” to maintaining green corridors and will not be changing any footpaths.\n<\/p>\n
\n He also said that the company is “happy” to grant a licence to a farmer impacted by the development to graze his sheep when they take hold of the land.\n<\/p>\n
\n Cllr Eric Butler did not support the plans, saying that there is “plenty of land” elsewhere for this sort of development.\n<\/p>\n
\n Similarly, Cllr Jon Neish said that he “cannot reconcile” with the idea that this development would stop farmer’s from growing food to feed the population with.\n<\/p>\n
\n The committee eventually approved the plans with six votes for, five against and two abstentions.\n<\/p>\n
\n Have you got a story you want to share with us? Get in touch at: francesca.herring@newsquest.co.uk or newsdesk@huntspost.co.uk.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Energy company, Bluefield Renewable Developments Ltd, applied for planning permission to build a solar farm and battery energy…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":289388,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3843],"tags":[728,70,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-289387","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-environment","8":"tag-environment","9":"tag-science","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114911360022800002","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/289387","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=289387"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/289387\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/289388"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=289387"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=289387"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=289387"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}