GENERATE PROSPECTUS - Flipbook - Page 27
Unlimited opportunities in the East of England
SOLAR, BIOENERGY
& ONSHORE WIND
THE SUNSHINE COAST
WELLS
The breadth and depth of the East of England’s
energy sector is not confined to offshore wind,
nuclear and gas. We also have a burgeoning
onshore sector with a particular strength in
solar PV, as well as onshore wind and bioenergy
(for power generation and the production of
biogas and biodiesel). These opportunities are
set to grow as landowners and farmers look at
ways of decarbonising agriculture, including by
taking land out of intensive cultivation.
CROMER
BACTON
KINGS LYNN
GT YARMOUTH
NORWICH
LOWESTOFT
DISS
The East of England is well known as a holiday
destination in part because it has a reputation
for being dry and sunny. In fact, Norfolk and
Suffolk benefit from around 1,600 sunshine
hours a year, making it an ideal location for
large scale solar farms. As a result, the East of
England already has in excess of 2GW of solar
PV capacity and developers are planning to
build many more, including the Sunnica Energy
Farm which would be the largest solar farm in
the UK.
That sunny climate has helped make Norfolk
and Suffolk one of the largest agricultural
regions in the UK, producing nearly 14% of
England’s crops and 9% of its livestock output.
It is also the largest straw producing region
in the UK, with around 310,000 hectares
of cereals and some 60,000 hectares of
oilseed grown each year, yielding more than
1 million tonnes of straw a year. This, along
with large quantities of animal waste and
other biomass available in the region, offers
significant opportunities for sustainable
energy generation.
SIZEWELL
BURY ST EDMUNDS
CAMBRIDGE
IPSWICH
FELIXSTOWE &
HARWICH
FREEPORT EAST
26
BRADWELL
2GW
INSTALLED
SOLAR PV
25
BIOENERGY
PLANTS
Unlimited opportunities in the East of England
Norfolk and Suffolk is already a leading area for
animal waste biomass installations, with a third of
the national capacity at two large power stations
near Thetford in Norfolk and Eye in Suffolk.
Snetterton in Norfolk is also home to one of the
UK’s newest straw-fed biomass plants. Overall,
the East of England has more than 560MW of
installed bio-energy capacity across 181 sites and
the bio-energy industry is estimated to be worth
in the region of £2 billion.
The region’s low-lying landscape is not as
windy as the SNS, where we have the UK’s
largest concentration of offshore wind farms.
Nevertheless, the East of England has a high
concentration of onshore wind farms with
around 480MW of capacity installed across
883 sites. This is set to grow – and with it the
operations, maintenance and installation
opportunities – as developers look to repower
older smaller turbines with larger more
efficient models.
480MW
ONSHORE WIND
POWER
A BRIGHT FUTURE
FOR SOLAR
The Sunnica Energy Farm, on the West Suffolk
border, would be the region’s first grid-scale
solar energy farm, with the capacity to send
up to 500MW of renewable energy to and
from the National Grid. This would be enough
to power around 100,000 homes. As well as
solar PV panels, it will include a battery energy
storage system, creating resilience in energy
supplies. The project, which is classed as a
Nationally Significant Infrastructure Project
due to the amount of renewable energy it
would produce, is currently going through the
planning system.
Meanwhile EDF Renewables has proposed
two 50MW solar farms for the region, at
Tye Lane near Ipswich and Bloys Grove near
Norwich. Both would be around 80 hectares
in size and include strong commitments to
improving biodiversity by maintaining existing
trees and hedgerows and planting more. At the
same time, by taking the land out of intensive
cultivation and encouraging meadow grasses
and flowers to grow under the solar panels, the
land will in time act as a carbon sink.
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