No.265 of 650 · approved, not built MP: Hilary Benn (Labour) England

Leeds South

Leeds South has 4.7 MW of clean power (all solar) approved and still not built: enough to supply a year's electricity to 1,700 homes. Britain's grid bottlenecks still add to bills here: about £92 a year per household, £4.9m across the constituency's 53,551 homes.

Not visible
here
No big wind farm on the national grid is mapped to this constituency, so no switch-off payments show here in national data. Smaller wind farms on the local grid can still be paid to switch off — invisibly. The £ figure for this seat is a floor, not a zero.
4.7 MW
of clean power — all solar — approved and still not built, enough to supply a year's electricity to 1,700 homes. Approved at least two years ago; waiting on the grid, not on planning.
11 projects · planning database (REPD), July 2026 · how we worked this out
£4.9m
is what the grid gap costs this constituency's 53,551 households in a year between them — £92 each, about 51 days of one home's electricity.
The £92 per household is a national figure — identical in every GB seat. Only the seat total varies, with the number of households · NESO · how we worked this out

The waiting list

6 of 11 waiting projects · years since approval
Gelderd Place, Holbeck - Solar Panles 0.2 MW
3.8 YRS
Shakespeare Primary School, Lincoln Road - Solar Panels 0.2 MW
3.7 YRS
Clapgate Primary School, Cranmore Drive - Solar PV Panels 0.2 MW
3.3 YRS
Temple Moor High School, Field End Grove - Solar Array 0.2 MW
3.2 YRS
Sharp Lane Primary School, Sharp Lane - Solar Panels 0.2 MW
3.2 YRS
Oco Technology, Knowsthorpe Gate - Solar Panels 0.3 MW
3.0 YRS

Every approved, unbuilt project

approved 24+ months ago, still not generating · planning database, July 2026
SiteTechnologyEnough forCapacityApprovedWaiting
Premier Farnell, Unit 3 - Solar PanelsSolar Photovoltaics800 homes2.3 MW2024-052.2 yrs
Holbeck Depot, Bridge Road - Solar PanelsSolar Photovoltaics200 homes0.4 MW2024-032.4 yrs
Network House, Beeston - Solar PanelsSolar Photovoltaics100 homes0.4 MW2024-012.6 yrs
J J Food Service, Middleton Grove - Solar Pv PanelsSolar Photovoltaics100 homes0.3 MW2023-092.9 yrs
Oco Technology, Knowsthorpe Gate - Solar PanelsSolar Photovoltaics100 homes0.3 MW2023-073.0 yrs
Clapgate Primary School, Cranmore Drive - Solar PV PanelsSolar Photovoltaics100 homes0.2 MW2023-033.3 yrs
Sharp Lane Primary School, Sharp Lane - Solar PanelsSolar Photovoltaics100 homes0.2 MW2023-063.2 yrs
Temple Moor High School, Field End Grove - Solar ArraySolar Photovoltaics100 homes0.2 MW2023-053.2 yrs
Shakespeare Primary School, Lincoln Road - Solar PanelsSolar Photovoltaics100 homes0.2 MW2022-113.7 yrs
Gelderd Place, Holbeck - Solar PanlesSolar Photovoltaics100 homes0.2 MW2022-103.8 yrs
Knostrop Wastewater Treatment Works - Solar ArraySolar Photovoltaics— MW2023-112.7 yrs

Plus 5 more approved within the last two years.

Batteries

projects of 10 MW and above · planning database, July 2026 · what batteries do →
SiteSizeStatusWhile discharging
Skelton Grange Battery Storage Facility99 MWapproved, not built 2021could supply ≈347,000 homes

What this page does not show

Smaller wind farms on the local grid are also switched off; national data does not show it, so the £ figure here is a floor, not a zero. Offshore wind is counted nationally, never per seat. The planning database can run a quarter behind reality.

Electricity does not travel from a particular project to particular houses. Everything generated goes into the national grid and everyone draws from that shared pool, so "enough for X homes" is a way of sizing the electricity — not a claim that these homes would be powered by this site. Battery storage is counted separately from generation: it moves power in time rather than making it.

Planning statuses come from the government's planning database (REPD), which records what was decided and when, but not why. Where a project was refused we say so and name the authority; for the reasons, look up the planning reference on that council's own register. How to check any figure on this page →

Read the full method, including everything we cannot see →

What has Hilary Benn said about the grid in Parliament? Search Hansard →

See the full league table Data (JSON)