Subsidy free is possible at only 10 MW in size

The Cleve Hill Solar Park developers are planning a massive 350 MW power station on the fields outside Faversham. This proposed development is so big in fact that it is the same size as the town of Faversham itself. The developers say that this is the only scale at which they can operate in a subsidy-free environment.

And yet its clear that this isn’t the case – Anesco built this 10 MW farm last year at Clayhill in Bedfordshire.

via Clayhill – the UK’s first subsidy-free solar farm – Anesco

Clayhill solar farm, located in Milton Keynes, was officially opened on 26 September 2017 by Claire Perry MP, the UK Minister for Climate Change & Industry.

It took 12 weeks to complete and combines the latest in solar and energy storage technology, with 10MW of solar PV co-located with 5 energy storage units totalling 6MW.

Note also the five ‘energy storage units’ that Anesco have installed on the site. These are the large shipping containers at the bottom of the picture. The company that made these is a Chinese firm called BYD. Here’s another shot of their battery product:

Cleve Hill Solar’s proposals include an “option for onsite storage technology” meaning that they could be looking at installing these on the same site. If the numbers scale up (Clayhill have 5 units for 10 MW) then Cleve Hill could be considering installing 175 of these on the site.