CONSTITUENCY BRIEFING · ENERGYMAP.APP
Bishop Auckland
Bishop Auckland has 52 MW of clean power (almost all solar) approved and still not built: enough to supply a year's electricity to 19,000 homes. When the wires are too full to carry the power, Britain pays wind farms to switch off instead. No wind farm here is paid that way — almost all of it goes to wind farms in Scotland. That cost is shared across every bill in Britain, so households here pay for it too: about £92 a year per household, £3.9m across the constituency's 42,733 homes.
Ranks 120 of 650 for clean power approved and not built.
What is stuck, and why
| Project and developer | Tech | Size | Why it is stuck |
|---|---|---|---|
| Bluestone Farm, Low Lands - Solar FarmBluefield Renewable Developments Limited | Solar | 18,000 homes 50 MW |
Approved 2 years ago — nothing has happened sinceWho can move it: the developer and the network company |
| Toronto Green Energy Park, Addison Road - Solar FarmToronto Green Energy Park Limited | Solar | 9,800 homes 27 MW |
Applied in 2026, still waiting for a decisionWho can move it: County Durham Council |
| Barnard Castle - Solar Farm & Battery Storage SystemFarm Energy Company | Solar | 5,800 homes 16 MW |
Approved a year ago — nothing has happened sinceWho can move it: the developer and the network company |
What else is in the briefing
- All 4 projects, each with its planning reference and the organisation that holds the next decision
- Every approval a project still needs, and which of them the public can see
- What building them would mean here — community payments, business rates and construction work
- How Bishop Auckland compares with its neighbouring constituencies
- Drafted parliamentary questions and letters, filled in with this seat's figures
- 3 story angles for local reporting
- A two-page PDF, and a newsroom edition with the references and who to call
No account needed for any of this:
the full seat page with every figure,
the method and sources,
and this constituency's raw data.
The account covers the packaged briefing only.