Call for home solar panels instead of solar farms

Building solar farms on farmland instead of adding panels to new homes is "madness", BBC Politics East has been told.

On the programme's Your Shout segment, Bengt Larson, from Bury St Edmunds, criticised plans to build huge solar farms on agricultural land when new homes were being built without panels.

The message was backed by MPs from the three main parties: Pam Cox (Lab, Colchester), Jerome Mayhew (Con, Broadland and Fakenham) and Marie Goldman (Lib Dem, Chelmsford).

The government said the new Energy Secretary Ed Miliband took "immediate action to boost the role solar projects play in the UK.. as the government accelerates to net zero to deliver its clean energy mission".

Hairdresser Mr Larson said new estates were being built near his home in the Mount Road area of Bury St Edmunds.

"They are building at the moment like there is no tomorrow," he said.

"I would like to see all the properties here filled with solar panels because it is the future.

"The planners have got to be forceful and say if you build these properties you have to include solar panels rather than at places like fields near Newmarket, where people are demonstrating against solar panels on a very large scale farming field - which is basically madness.

"We are using good farmland for something that is not necessary.

"Denmark has a small population but we do have a lot of windmills and a lot of solar power.

"Where I come from the local coal power station was closed down because it is all solar and windmill power, but no solar panels on farmland there, because the farmland is too valuable to be used."

The Liberal Democrat MP for Chelmsford, Marie Goldman, said she agreed "100%" with Mr Larson.

"It's absolutely crazy this isn't the case," she said.

"It should also be a lot easier for people to retrofit solar panels on existing roofs."

Conservative MP for Broadland and Fakenham, Jerome Mayhew, said he had been campaigning for solar panels to part of a future homes grant.

"I don't think they should be mandatory because there'll be some roofs where it is not appropriate," he said.

"But there should be the expectation (of fitted panels) on all new builds."

The Labour MP for Colchester, Pam Cox, said solar panels would be "part of Labour's reform of the planning system".

"Solar is one of the routes to go but there are other ways of heating and providing energy to communities with ground source heat pumps," she said.

A spokesman for the Department of Energy Security said that after the election, Mr Miliband approved three major solar power projects - Gate Burton, Mallard Pass, and Sunnica.

Taken together, these projects could potentially unlock more than 1.3GW, powering the equivalent of up to 400,000 homes per year, he added.

Mr Miliband said: "I want to unleash a UK solar rooftop revolution.

"We will encourage builders and homeowners in whatever way we can to deliver this win-win technology to millions of addresses in the UK so people can provide their own electricity, cut their bills and at the same time help fight climate change."

BBC Politics East will be broadcast on Sunday, 6 October at 10:00 GMT on BBC One in the East of England, and will be available after broadcast on BBC iPlayer.

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