Photo voltaic farm sees grid connection minimize by ‘greater than a decade’

Wokingham Borough Council’s Barkham photo voltaic farm has been granted a grid connection “greater than a decade earlier”.

The 29MW photo voltaic farm, being developed together with essential contractor Equans, was initially given a grid connection date of 2037. As an alternative, by way of an settlement with Scottish and Southern Electrical Networks (SSEN), the revised grid connection is ready for summer season 2026.

In an announcement, the Council confirmed that the revised connection date was the results of “months of lobbying for reform within the power sector” alongside discussions with Nationwide Grid and SSEN on why the scheme needs to be prioritised.

The following steps for the venture embrace an replace on the photo voltaic farm’s plan and enterprise case, which is ready to be offered at a Local weather Emergency Overview and Scrutiny assembly on 29 February.

Preliminary works over the approaching months will embrace a collection of 62 archaeological trenches dug to the south of the positioning, near an current greenway subsequent to California Nation Park. These works mark the placement of the brand new woodlands, which shall be planted later within the yr.

Important work to put in the photo voltaic panels will start in 2025 and shall be fastidiously coordinated with different Council tasks within the space.

Councillor Stephen Conway, chief of Wokingham Borough Council, stated: “That is unbelievable information and displays the work we’ve performed to construct sturdy relationships with SSEN and to exhibit why schemes like this are so essential regionally.

“Not simply in how they characterize a giant a part of our local weather emergency motion plan and lowering carbon emissions regionally, however in how they generate revenue which we will make investments again into offering companies for our residents.”

A step in the proper route in lowering grid connection instances

Though it is extremely vital that the photo voltaic venture has a capability of 29MW, and would be the first that the Council owns, maybe essentially the most hanging improvement is the drastic shift in grid connection.

The subject of grid connections has been explored extensively each on Photo voltaic Energy Portal and our sister publication Present± the place we ran a mini-series and has proved to be one of many largest obstacles to Britain’s internet zero prospects.

Final yr, we sat down with Peter Kavanagh, CEO and founding father of Concord Vitality, to debate grid connections, the place he emphasised that “grid connections earlier than 2030 are a battle” within the present local weather.

This stark warning reiterated what many throughout the trade had been stating. With Britain’s grid shifting away from a number of coal-fired crops offering nearly all of the nation’s power combine, the transition to a bigger variety of smaller era websites is proving troublesome for the nation’s internet zero objectives.

A number of initiatives have been carried out to deal with the continued subject. Maybe essentially the most outstanding is the transition to Nationwide Grid ESO’s “first prepared, first linked” strategy to grid connections.

It’s value noting that Nationwide Grid additionally revealed late final yr that it will speed up the connection of as much as 10GW of battery power storage tasks throughout England and Wales, with these being provided dates to plug in, on common, 4 years sooner than their present settlement.

With the Barham photo voltaic farm’s grid connection date having been minimize by as much as a decade, that is clearly a sign that the difficulty is on the trail to restoration.