Parish residents may be interested in this article about Lime Down Solar Park forwarded by Soffi Bond, and may wish to sign the petition.
We in Foxley and the surrounding area have just had a bombshell dropped on us – 2000 acres of land is to be turned into a solar park. It will be two-thirds the size of the whole of Heathrow Airport comprising of one million solar panels. It covers much of Foxley, Norton, Grittleton, Sherston, Luckington and Hullavington covering green field after green field in beautiful countryside. Building will take two years but before that it will take over 7 months for HGVs to fill a field full of infrastructure and equipment which is right opposite some friends of ours. There will be CCTV and high steel fences together with security lights.
The Daily Mail came to photograph us all protesting last Thursday morning and there was a double-page spread in the Saturday edition of the newspaper in print and online. There was also a before and after photograph of a neighbour’s house which would be surrounded on three sides by solar panels as far as the eye could see while the fourth side was the lane in front of the house. Yesterday we heard that the developers intend to tarmac part of the Fosse Way, the Roman road stretching from Exeter to Lincoln which crosses the fields nearby. They intend to do that in order to reach the fields in Foxley. Sheer vandalism. They intend to make it possible for HGVs to travel down our single track lanes destroying the verges and habitats either side of the lanes. And of course our houses will all be blighted – our neighbour has already had interest in her lovely home withdrawn because of this threat.
It is a gravy train for several wealthy landowners in the area. And after 30 years the land will never return to farmland as it will become so depleted it will turn to brownfield development.
Please help us to stop this solar park. It is so vast the developers have to go to the Secretary of State, not Wiltshire Council, to obtain planning permission.
Please the sign the petition to introduce new restrictions on mega solar facilities to protect land and farmland in particular, food security and to conserve biodiversity.
https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/651262
We need to get 10,000 signatures at least before we get any traction with government.
The Lime Down Solar Park project website is available here.
