A massive industrial solar utility is proposed, spread over rural Northamptonshire. Announced in spring 2024, the Green Hill Solar farm’s 2,965-acre multi-site locations will cover farmland and greenfield spaces, bordering or significantly affecting the villages of Grendon, Easton Maudit, Bozeat, Mears Ashby, Earls Barton, Holcot, Old, Walgrave and beyond. Underground cabling linking all sites back to Grendon substation and possibly another substation further north, will affect many more people.
The 4.63 square mile area, of fields filled with solar panels and battery storage systems, includes an additional 600-acre site added in May 2024, at Warrington, Bedfordshire, stretching back towards the village of Lavendon. In late June 2024, a further 161-acres of ‘land under consideration’ was included near Walgrave, for ‘solar and associated development’.
Stop Green Hill Solar farm.
Have your say.
We want renewable energies, but in the right locations.
Green Hill Solar farm will be one of the largest solar utilities in the UK, outputting up to 500 MW of power and covering an area nearly as big as Heathrow airport. The Mears Ashby site alone covers around 1,000 acres, and the Grendon and Easton Maudit installation spreads across more than 770 acres.
The 60-year, ‘temporary’ solar panel fields will connect into the National Grid substation in Grendon and maybe another substation elsewhere. Further battery storage developments (BESS), similar to the new one in Grendon, are planned.
The fields of rotating and/or fixed solar photovoltaic arrays will connect to the substation via underground cabling, passing through open land, roads and waterways. Households along possible cabling routes may have already received letters. The developers confirm there could be compulsory purchase of land to accommodate cable ducts: cable route search areas are bordered in orange on maps.
Such is the industrial size of the proposed solar farm it is considered an NSIP: a Nationally Significant Infrastructure Project, as was HS2. The planning application will be approved or rejected by the Secretary of State, not local councils.
