The Science Museum's plans to build a giant solar farm at an old World War Two airfield in Wiltshire finally got the go-ahead this week from communities secretary Eric Pickles.
Working in partnership with Swindon Borough Council, the Science Museum Group is planning to build a 41MW solar farm at the site of its big-object store in Wroughton.
The £45m to £50m scheme was first unveiled at the start of 2013 and was initially hoped to be built by the end of that year. However, Pickles used his new powers to call the scheme in for a public inquiry in April 2014, with a decision being made only yesterday.
James Owen, commercial director of Public Power Solutions, which is the joint venture set up by the Science Museum and Swindon Borough Council to develop the plant, said construction would begin as soon as possible.
The government is set to close the Renewable Obligation Certificate (ROC) subsidy to large solar farms at the end of this month, but the Wroughton solar farm will still be paid 1.3 ROCs per megawatt hour because it had invested substantial amounts of money in the project before the government announced the changes.
The panels will be installed on the former RAF airfield, where the museum stores many of its objects – only eight per cent of the 220,000 objects it manages are on display at any one time.
Owen also said that local people would soon be able to invest in the solar farm through a community benefit fund. Up to 5MW of capacity will be made available for people to take a stake in, with minimum investments set at £50 per person.
"We've been overwhelmed by the very strong support from the local community and politicians across the political spectrum throughout this lengthy process. We'd like to say a huge thank you to everyone who came along to one of our events, took the time to send a letter or helped spread the word," said Owen in a statement.
Pickles has come under fire from renewables groups over his record of calling in and rejecting clean energy projects.
But this is the second solar farm the Communities Secretary has approved in a week, after he granted consent to the Lark Energy's 24WM development at Ellough Airfield - a project he had initally rejected against planners' recommendations. That decision was overturned in the High Court last year.
In related news, the government yesterday confirmed that 62 new renewable power projects have benefitted from a £25m community energy fund that it set up last year for England.
In an update to its Community Energy Strategy, the Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC) said it would invest £150,000 in a new online community energy hub that will offer advice to organisations installing their own solar farms or wind turbines.
Josh Roberts, climate and energy lawyer at ClientEarth, welcomed the new report and efforts by government to focus on boosting community-owned energy as a whole.
However, he said community energy projects would suffer as a result of the Treasury's removal of favourable tax treatment for investments in community projects, and the Financial Conduct Authority's refusal to register new co-operative societies.
"The government must come forward with solutions to provide a more stable and consistent law and policy environment for community energy," he said in a statement. "The strategy update aims to address some of these issues, and in particular we hope the government follows through with its commitment to addressing longer-term issues, starting with improving the network connection process for community projects."
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