The Church Commissioners is working on plans to integrate renewable energy projects with its development sites, including putting a solar farm alongside a 5,000-home scheme.
The landowner has a 7,500-acre development portfolio and 82,000-acre rural estate, which embraces food production, sites of special scientific interest, nature reserves and renewable energy schemes.
Ciara Williams, the organisation’s principal rural asset manager, told EG: “We are starting to look at how we knit together renewable energy projects and development sites.
“It might not be appropriate to have renewables within a development site, but we have then got a wider estate that can deliver it and those two things can be intertwined. We’re looking at solar, for example, which might sit alongside future development.”
Joanna Loxton, Church Commissioners head of strategic land, said she is seeking to progress “one scheme of about 5,000 homes where we are hoping to put a solar farm alongside it”. She did not disclose the location.
The Church Commissioners works with housebuilders and developers and expects to deliver about 30,000 new homes, of which around 10,000 will be affordable, from its current strategic land portfolio.
This means it “would take forward more new housing and communities than any other private landowner in England,” according to its recent sustainability report. Sites run from Carlisle down to Falmouth and from Kent up to South Tyneside.
“There are about 60 sites that we currently say are strategic land sites. That is anything with a draft allocation through to being delivered on site,” Loxton said.
Those are “immediate term” projects, although they may be delivered over the next 20 years.
For more on how the Church Commissioners plans to help tackle the housing shortage, read our EG interview in this week’s issue or on egi.co.uk/news/ from Friday morning.
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