Community energy scheme completes subsidy-free solar farm in Devon

A community energy scheme has announced the completion of a 7.3MW solar farm in Devon, part of which has been built without any subsidies.

With a generation capacity of 4.4MW, the first phase of the Creacombe project is accredited to receive subsidies through Feed-in Tariff scheme and was commissioned at the end of December. The second subsidy-free phase has a capacity of 2.9MW and was commissioned at the end of January.

Construction was overseen by Community Owned Renewable Energy (CORE) Partners – a £50 million investment programme funded Power to Change and Big Society Capital – which acquired the solar farm last year as a consented project. CORE says it is the first ground-mounted community solar project in the UK to be built without subsidies.

Yealm Community Energy (YCE), which also owns a share, plans to issue an investment offer over the summer to allow local residents to buy stakes in both Creacombe and another nearby solar farm called Newton Downs that CORE acquired in 2017.

YCE chair Peter Brown said: “It is over five years since Yealm Community Energy started to explore the idea of bringing a community solar farm to this part of Devon, and we are very pleased that Creacombe has been able to navigate the ‘solarcoaster’ and is now complete and generating power.

“Both solar farms will be able to generate enough electricity to supply the equivalent of all the homes in our five local parishes helping to meet our net zero commitments.

“Equally important, once we have completed the share offer so they are community owned we expect to generate a healthy profit which will be spent locally to grow other exciting initiatives to tackle the climate crisis such as energy efficiency, electric vehicles and more green power generation.”

Creacombe will be operated by Bright Renewables – a community-owned renewable asset manager founded by CORE and Power to Change in 2018.