By Renewable Energy Focus staff

The solar PV park has been erected at the same site as a 16 MW wind farm consisting of 20 wind turbines has been operating since 2008.

In connection with the opening Ecotricity Founder Dale Vince says the company had planned several large-scale solar installations that could have gone live in 2011, but that with the UK Government’s U-turn on feed-in tariffs, those plans have now been scrapped.

“If this is the ‘Greenest Government’ ever, why are they strangling our solar industry at birth? With a big question mark right now over nuclear power, and huge climate change targets to hit, this is a crazy step to make, especially in the name of saving money.

“Indigenous sources of energy will save British taxpayers enormous sums of money in the coming decades – just last week energy prices rose by 10%, that’s £50 per year per household – contrast that with the measly £5 per year this Government are willing to see spent on building our own energy sources. If anything defines a false economy it’s this.”