Councillors in East Riding have called for the Government to create caps on the amount of agricultural land in any one area that can be converted into solar farms. They also instructed the council to produce a clear guide to help people engage with nationally significant infrastructure projects (NSIPs).
These are where a development’s scale is too large for a council to make the final decision, with the planning inspectorate instead managing the process and a Government minister having the final say. The solar farm-focused motion, proposed by Cllr Victoria Aitken (Conservative – Howdenshire Ward), comes after a spate of major solar farm developments put forward in East Riding in recent years.
Some residents have organised a concerted campaign against such, in a group known as East Riding Against Solar Expansion (ERASE). ERASE members protested outside full council at Beverley Town Hall.
They later watched on as Cllr Aitken’s proposal was backed unanimously. ERASE spokesman George McManus called it “brilliant news”.
“A great leap forward. This is the culmination of our two year campaign to get the public involved in the process.
“The council must now deliver on its promise to provide clear guidance to residents on how to get involved. We are currently sleepwalking towards a great tragedy, the despoiling of our beautiful countryside,” he warned of the growth of solar farms.
‘We should not be concentrating this scale of development in our rural areas’
Cllr Aitken noted there are five NSIP solar farms, too large to be decided on by councillors because they involve a 50MW or greater solar farm, in the works in East Riding. She said the East Yorkshire Solar Farm site planned in her ward was comparable in size to the city of Durham.
“We should not be concentrating this scale of development in our rural areas,” she said. She said her proposal called “for a clear, plain English guide” to explain the NSIP process and how residents can engage effectively.
Fellow councillors backed her proposal. “These represent an existential threat to our farmland,” said Cllr Jeremy Wilcock (Liberal Democrat – Beverley Rural), on major solar farms.
Green Cllr Andy Walker (Bridlington South) expressed support for solar in the context of the climate emergency, but added: “If energy security comes at the cost of food security, that’s not an intelligent solution.”
Cllr Denise Howard (Reform UK – East Wolds and Coastal) argued, “We can’t eat solar panels and at some point, food production has to take precedence.” Two amendments were proposed, but both failed.
Cllr Walker suggested the cap call protect not just prime agricultural land, but good quality-rated land too, and called for developers to look more at ‘agrivoltaics’, where solar farms and agriculture coexist in the same field.
Cllr Phillip Redshaw (Lib Dem – Cottingham North) called for a Government planning rule change to consider concerns about the potential impact of large Battery Energy Storage Systems (BESS) in NSIP solar farms on the local water system. “The East Riding chalk aquifer is one of our most important natural assets,” he said.
“As more solar developments include large-scale battery storage facilities, it is only right that any potential risks to groundwater and public water supplies are subject to rigorous scrutiny before consent is granted.” Cllr Aitken recognised the importance of water, but felt it could complicate her motion, which was about simplifying the planning system for residents.
‘This is about fairness, balance, and making sure people feel informed and empowered’
Reacting to her motion’s success, Cllr Aitken said the proposal highlighted the disconnect for communities with NSIPs, where the impact is local, but decision-making is not. She said East Riding was seeing “the increasing concentration of very large-scale developments in rural areas, without proper consideration of the cumulative impact.
“We must ask a simple but crucial question: how much is too much in one place?” As for the guide to NSIPs the council will now produce, she said: “This is about fairness, balance, and making sure people feel informed and empowered, not shut out of decisions that affect the places they call home.”
She said unanimous support sent a clear message to Government. “We need a planning system that delivers renewable energy, but also protects our countryside, values our farmland, and respects the communities who live there.”
By: Ivan Morris Poxton, LDRS
