Herb supplier Langmeads is installing a new solar panel site the size of 15 football pitches that will be able to power 1,300 homes.
Based at Ferry Farm, near Selsey, the new facility is the company’s first community’s owned solar site. In total, Langmeads will now produce enough energy to power 12,500 homes, displacing 17,000 tonnes of CO2 a year from a total of 40MW of solar panels.
Graham Leech, Langmead chief executive officer, said: “Renewable energy is a sustainable and diversified use of part of our land. Our existing sites in West Sussex are operating well ahead of our UV conversion efficiency targets due to the high light levels close to the sea and the quality of our installation engineering.
“The community-owned site at Ferry Farm will provide an annual income benefit to the community for the next 20 years, as we contribute through all our sites to the UK’s renewable energy targets.”
Ferry Farm Community Solar will earn the local area community an estimated £1.5 million over the next 20 years through a share of profits from the site.
Located on poor quality farmland and close to sewage works, Ferry Farm makes use of unappealing land and improves the efficiency of Langmead’s farming business, Langmeads said.
The West Sussex firm said its energy business evolved out of a desire to find alternative uses for its land. Ferry Farm is situated on the Manhood Peninsula, which has one of the best sunshine records in the UK. After gaining planning permission in 2013 for its first solar site, Langmeads partnered with solar energy company BNRG Renewables, to develop a number of projects together across the UK.
The Langmead energy business now includes other renewables, such as water recycling from its factories and glasshouses, reed bed water management, biomass-fuelled heating, green waste recycling and compost facilities.
