Care home invests in solar power

PLANNING permission has been granted for a solar farm in North Manchester.

Brookvale Care Home, advised by Indigo Planning, has received permission from Bury Council to install the facility on green belt land in Prestwich.

Brookvale, which has been providing specialist care to young people with learning disabilities for over 60 years, has joined up with renewable energy consultant Solar Choice to build a ground mounted solar farm that will provide energy for the care home for the next 35 to 40 years.

It says that in order to become as self-sufficient as possible following recent reductions in public funding and increases in fuel prices, the care home has been actively investing in energy saving solutions.  It currently has two wind turbines to the rear of the building and solar panels on some of the existing buildings.

The ground-mounted photovoltaic solar farm will comprise a 499.2KWp system of 1,920 panels on land to the rear of the care home. The annual yield will be approximately 770 kWh/ kWp, enough to save over 200kg of CO2 emissions every year.

Lynne Richmond from Brookvale Care Home said: “Installing the solar panels will result in significant benefits, reducing electrical energy by over 50%, which equates to over 200 tonnes of CO2 saved per annum.  As Brookvale operates as a charity, this will be a huge saving.

Indigo Planning worked with the local authority, Solar Choice and Brookvale on the application.

Ajay Hargreaves from Solar Choice said: “This solar farm will help the care home to work towards being self-sufficient, and construction is likely to begin this summer.”

Nick Fillingham, associate director at Indigo Planning, said: “Since the site is situated in the green belt, we carefully demonstrated that very special circumstances existed to warrant approval of the scheme. The planning committee’s unanimous decision is testament to the hard work of the team and the longevity of the fantastic work and support provided by Brookvale Care Home.”

Construction of the solar park will begin in summer 2015.