Large solar farm at Pulham approved by councillors

Despite claims it would harm the Dorset Area of Natural Beauty and lead to a loss of good quality farmland members of the Dorset Council area planning committee voted 8-1 to approve the development, one abstaining.

The solar farm, spread over 190 acres, will be big enough to power up to 13,000 homes for 35 years, operated by British Solar Renewables.

From north to south the site stretches for almost a mile across countryside Thomas Hardy frequently wrote about, referring it as “the vale of little dairies.”

Concerns were also raised about the impacts of the construction phase on surrounding villages and the potential for the development to increase the risk of flood, although council officers claimed the flood risk would not increase.

Planning committee chairman Cllr Robin Cook said although Dorset was high in the league table for having renewable energy schemes the rural county will still need to find 190,000 acres for solar schemes, or 700 wind turbines – or a combination of both to meet climate change targets.

“That will mean quite a large amount of land which is useable. I suspect it’s a circle we can’t square,” he said.

Wimborne councillor Shane Bartlett said the pressure to find space for renewable schemes was “quite bewildering” given that almost all applications were controversial. He suggested now might be the time to start looking at power from tidal schemes in addition to on land.

He said that despite reservations he would support the Pulham solar scheme because he believed that council officers had done all they could to mitigate the effects of the development.

Anthony Cake, who farms adjoining land, told the planning committee his family were worried about the increased risk of flood to their holding which, he said, had become more frequent in recent years and had already led to big increases in his insurance premium even before the scheme was built. He said he had not been directly consulted by the developers.

Maria Bentley from Mappowder said she was concerned about how the council had judged the impact of the scheme on one of the county’s best landscapes, also taking good farmland out of production and not taking into account the views of those who lived downstream of the site.

She, and others, said more collective ‘weight’ should have been given to the detrimental effects.

Ward councillor Pauline Batstone said there had been nobody ‘beating a path to her door’ to support the scheme while over 200 had written to the council to oppose it, despite what she claimed some saw as a “flawed consultation process.”

She said that energy produced would go into the National Grid, which was good, but there would be no direct local benefit.

“This may not be top quality agricultural land but it’s still capable of producing top quality food with the right farming management, sustaining local families and jobs,” she said.

“Tourism is now a vital  part of the North Dorset economy and imposing a large area of glass panels in the middle of Hardy’s ‘vale of little dairies’ on the edge of an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, so close to two conservation areas and surrounded by 55 heritage assets is detrimental to our aims and sacrilege…. There is nothing to be gained from this development for my residents, the only ones to gain will be those renting out the land and the developers who don’t live here,” she said to applause.

Fran Button from British Solar Renewables said the scheme would have a positive impact on the planet and deliver a 74% biodiversity net gain as well as providing local jobs during the construction phase.

She said some panels had been moved to minimise the impact and the company accepted that even with its mitigation measures the site it would be seen within the Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty and that part of the access track did cross a flood risk area. But she said it was necessary to go ahead, especially as the development could achieve immediate national grid access, while other sites were facing a ten-year wait.

“You only have to look at the headlines in the papers and the fires burning in Europe to realise that we have a real climate emergency and the time to act is now. Renewable energy can be part of that solution,” she said.

The site is spread over 11 field between Pulham to the West, Hazelbury Bryan to the east and Mappowder to the south. It is expected to produce 50MW of power – helping displace 10,400 tonnes of Carbon Dioxide each year, equivalent to the gases from 5,800 cars.

Tracks for maintenance and construction will be built and the site ringed by 2.2m high security fencing. The majority of existing hedgerows and trees would be kept to help screen the panels and equipment with additional planting added to the site.

The construction phases is estimated at five months with site access via the North Dairy Farm track with an average of 10-11 two-way vehicles movements per day.

Once completed there would only be one visit a week for maintenance and security.

Dorset planning officers told the committe that, in their view, there would not be an increase in the risk of flooding from the development, based on the technical studies carried out – and if there was ‘harm’ to the wider area, it would be less than substantial, compared to the overall benefits of the scheme.