Biggest solar farm application submitted for North Devon

Two districts will decide together

Two local authority planning committees are to join forces to decide on what is believed to be the biggest ever solar farm application in northern Devon.

Torridge District Council and North Devon Council, who already share a joint local plan, have agreed to band together as the application, which has been submitted but not yet validated and so not in the public domain, straddles the two districts.

Members of Torridge said at their full council meeting this week that if the proposal was considered by the committees individually and they came to  different decisions it would create a bit of a problem.

Torridge will have its full contingent of nine planning committee members on the case and there will be nine of the 12 from North Devon’s including a chairperson, who can make the casting vote.

This was considered the appropriate way forward given that 60 per cent of the application site is in North Devon and 40 per cent in Torridge.

Cllr David Brenton (Lab, Bideford South) said he could see hidden dangers with this as the casting vote could sometimes be very critical and Torridge’s vote could be “suppressed”

But Cllr Bob Hicks (Ind, Monkleigh and Putford) said he didn’t see any issues: “As the alternating chairman of the joint planning policy committee working directly with North Devon, we get on extremely well,” he said.

Cllr Chris Leather (Ind, Northam) said: “It makes sense as we are all singing from the same local plan anyway.”

Having seen the plans he said he believed this to be largest ever solar farm application the two areas had ever seen.

The council’s monitoring officer Staci Dorey said the applicant would prefer a joint plans committee to avoid separate discussions taking place on the same day.

In 2023 the CPRE produced a map to show that nine of the largest solar farms (more than 100 acres) in Devon were in the local authority areas of Torridge, North Devon, Mid Devon and East Devon.