A CAMPAIGN group has objected to plans for a 28-acre solar farm on the outskirts of Oxford.

The site is located off the B4027, between the villages of Beckley and Elsfield to the north of Oxford.

Campaign to Protect Rural England’s Oxfordshire branch said the solar farm would be harmful to the Green Belt and an “unnecessary loss” of agricultural land.

But the company behind the plans, Lightsource Renewable Energy, said the site would save 2,400 tonnes of carbon emissions each year, the equivalent of taking 549 cars off the road. In a written consultation response CPRE Oxfordshire chairman Michael Tyce said: “For a period of at least 35 years, and perhaps indefinitely, the development would harm the openness of the Green Belt and the settings of Oxford and Elsfield.

“The trivial amount of electricity produced in the summer months would do nothing to outweigh the harm the development would cause.”

In 2012, proposals for a 74-acre solar farm, estimated to potentially generate power for 3,000 homes, were put forward at the same farm by a different company, ADAS.

The firm dropped the plans, for Green Belt land between Beckley and Barton, in February 2013 after negative feedback from South Oxfordshire District Council planners.

The consultation deadline for the Lightsource Renewable Energy plans is Friday, August 7.

Comments can be made at southandvale.gov.uk and by searching for P15/S2202/FUL.

A decision is expected on September 30.