Green light for huge UK solar park

The UK government has given approval for the development of the country’s largest solar park at Cleve Hill in Kent.

To be built on an area of 364 hectares, the €500 million plant will contain 880,000 solar panels. The solar park’s proposed battery facility alone is set to cover an area of more than 10 hectares, making it one of the largest in the world.

Construction is set to start early in 2021, with the 350MW project expected to be powering over 90,000 homes by 2023.

The solar park, a joint venture project between Hive Energy and Wirsol Energy promises to reduce the UK’s reliance on fossil fuels and lower CO2 emissions by 68,000 tonnes per year.

The Guardian recently reported that the UK has recorded record levels of clean electricity in the past few weeks, reaching a high of 9.68GW in April. This has led to the country enjoying its longest period without coal-fired power since the Industrial Revolution.

By 2025, the UK government has committed to the closure of all of its coal-fired power stations, which currently produce approximately 25% of the country’s energy generation requirements.

It is forecast that the country’s reliance on solar power could rise to 27GW by 2030.