Campaigners slam impact of North Yorkshire solar farms

The warning comes after the Government gave approval for the 190MW Helios solar farm, to the west of the village of Camblesforth, near Selby.

Following the decision, members of Rooftops Not Countryside – North Yorkshire Against Light Valley Solar have issued a map showing the solar schemes planned for the south of the county.

The group was formed to fight the 500MW Light Valley Solar project, which would include seven solar farms on a 2,520-acre site, between York and Selby.

Like the Helios scheme, Light Valley has been declared a Nationally Significant Infrastructure Project (NSIP), meaning it will be decided by the Secretary of State rather than local councillors.

Louise Billingham, from the campaign group, said the image highlighted how the region was becoming an “industrial centre”.

She added: “One thing that no one seems to be talking about is that behind all these patches of colour on a map, there are real people who are having their lives fall apart.

“People whose businesses and homes are now worth virtually nothing, who are having serious mental health problems as a result of these proposals, who are having issues with friends and family as a result and who are facing huge uncertainty about what their life will be like going forward.

“It feels utterly wrong that if these sites weren’t under the umbrella of national infrastructure, they wouldn’t get planning permission at all, and if by some miracle they did, they would have to compensate those affected.”

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Mrs Billingham said members of the group had expected the Helios scheme to be given approval, adding, “sadly, Camblesforth is no longer a rural village”.

“We’re seeing green energy sites and data sites being given the go-ahead, replacing our fields at an alarming rate,” she said.

“This is partly due to a political shift, but also due to councils not being correctly funded and loopholes in planning law, which developers are taking advantage of.

“There are numerous green energy applications currently going through the planning system all at the same time, but the Planning Inspectorate does not take these into consideration when approving sites like the Helios or Light Valley Solar developments.

“They only look at sites that have already been approved. This means that they have a very misleading picture of the cumulative impact in the area. Our concern is that the reality of all of the plans together means that the local area will be inundated and irreparably changed.”

Giving approval for the Helios solar farm last week, Energy Minister Martin McCluskey said the scheme was a step towards making Britain a “clean energy superpower”.

He said the only way to make British people better off in the face of rising energy bills in the long term was by securing clean, homegrown power.