North Ayrshire and Arran
North Ayrshire and Arran has 74 MW of clean power (mostly solar) approved and still not built: enough to supply a year's electricity to 33,000 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, £4.1m across the constituency's 44,516 homes. There is also 100 MW of wind running here on the local network. If that gets switched off, no national record shows it.
here
The waiting list
Every approved, unbuilt project
| Site | Technology | Enough for | Capacity | Approved | Waiting |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Benthead Farm - Solar Farm & Battery Storage | Solar Photovoltaics | 23,000 homes | 63.0 MW | 2023-08 | 3.0 yrs |
| Sorbie Farm | Wind Onshore | 7,900 homes | 9.0 MW | 2014-06 | 12.1 yrs |
| Standingstone Hill | Wind Onshore | 2,200 homes | 2.5 MW | 2019-11 | 6.7 yrs |
Plus 5 more approved within the last two years.
Batteries
| Site | Size | Status | While discharging |
|---|---|---|---|
| Hunterston Grid Services Complex - Energy Storage Facility | 400 MW | approved, not built 2022 | could supply ≈1,402,000 homes |
| Flemyland Battery Storage | 100 MW | approved, not built 2024 | could supply ≈350,000 homes |
| High Boydstone Farm - Battery Energy Storage Facility | 100 MW | approved, not built 2025 | could supply ≈350,000 homes |
| Crosbie Wind Farm | 50 MW | in planning | could supply ≈175,000 homes |
| Benthead Farm - Solar Farm & Battery Storage | 31 MW | approved, not built 2023 | could supply ≈109,000 homes |
| Meiklelaught Farm - Battery Storage | 30 MW | approved, not built 2023 | could supply ≈105,000 homes |
| Ardoch Farm | 20 MW | approved, not built 2025 | could supply ≈70,000 homes |
| Wardlaw Wood Windfarm - Battery Storage | 20 MW | approved, not built 2023 | could supply ≈70,000 homes |
| North West Of Jameston Farm | 20 MW | approved, not built 2021 | could supply ≈70,000 homes |
| Tofts - Battery Storage | 20 MW | approved, not built 2023 | could supply ≈70,000 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 →
What has Irene Campbell said about the grid in Parliament? Search Hansard →