Sir – On Friday, April 4, the Department of Energy and Climate Change stated its opposition to the creation of more solar farms in the countryside. On Monday, April 7, the local news on BBC1 referred briefly to a plan for a large 5MW solar installation on some 30 acres of land in the Evenlode valley just below Charlbury.
This is not a new proposal; it was rejected two years ago by the local planning authority, chiefly on the grounds that it would impair the fragile beauty of a highly visible stretch of country familiar to walkers, train-travellers and others.
Its proposed location is immediately across the Evenlode from the south end of Cornbury Park, near the Cotswold Line, the B4022 and a foot- and cycle-path between Charlbury and Finstock.
Sustainable Charlbury, the unofficial body promoting this scheme, claims a healthy level of support from local residents. In fact their recent, house-to-house questionnaire, which (I was told) showed 87 per cent of respondents to be in favour, was ignored by the vast majority of residents.
The apparent aim of the scheme is to raise an income for local projects, create an opportunity for local investment and feed ‘green electricity’ into the National Grid.
Not all residents may have grasped, however, that they will not have direct access to this electricity, while the very ‘un-green’ apparatus used to generate it will blight a nearby stretch of country for a generation or more. West Oxfordshire District Council’s planning committee is shortly to discuss the revised proposal for this solar farm.
I would urge anyone with an interest in the matter to make their feelings known to the planning authorities before it is too late.
Brigid Sturdy, Charlbury