UK’s Truss Doesn’t Want Solar Panels Built on Farmland

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(Bloomberg) — British Prime Minister Liz Truss doesn’t support solar panels being built on farmland that can be used to grow food. 

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Blocking or limiting solar development would stymie the build out of clean electricity generation with the potential to supply millions of English homes with low-cost power. Truss has been clear that she doesn’t agree with productive agricultural land being used for solar farms, her official spokesman Max Blain told reporters in a regular briefing.

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Blain was responding to questions about a report by The Guardian that ministers plan to ban solar farms from most of England’s farmland.

“As well as the energy security issue, we face a food security issue,” Blain said.

So-called 3b land is a category of farm land that’s the lowest-cost and most popular for installing panels in England, according to Chris Hewett, chief executive officer of industry group Solar Energy UK. Changes to the type of land that’s available to developers could slash investment in one of the cheapest forms of electricity in Britain just as the Treasury is paying out billions of pounds to subsidize soaring energy bills. 

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A spokesperson for the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs didn’t respond to a request for comment.

While wind power is much more dominant in the UK, solar still plays an important role. The sector has been growing steadily and can complement wind, producing energy during hot summer days when it’s too still to spin the country’s fleet of turbines. 

“Slowing down bringing more renewables onto the system will cost the government a lot of money,” Hewett said in an interview.

There are at least 6 gigawatts of solar farms in the UK that already have the necessary permits and will be built in the coming years. But there are as many as 30 gigawatts of projects, roughly enough to power more than 8 million British homes, that likely wouldn’t get built if the planning rules were to change, Hewett said. 

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A change to how land can be used “would be a huge overcorrection which would nearly wipe out the pipeline of one of the cheapest sources of energy in an energy crisis,” Sam Hall, director of the Conservative Environment Network, said on Twitter. 

The most recent solar projects to win government support agreed to sell power for roughly a quarter of average wholesale power prices this year. And unlike far flung offshore wind resources, the best places for solar are nearby population centers in the south of England, meaning they require less extensive investments in the power grid. 

The possible move is also taking fire from the opposition Labour Party. 

“If the Conservatives go ahead with blocking solar energy, it will be yet more unilateral energy disarmament from a government that has a 12-year record of driving up bills by blocking clean power,” Ed Miliband, Labour’s shadow climate and net zero secretary, said on Twitter.