North Northumberland
North Northumberland has 13 MW of clean power (all solar) approved and still not built: enough to supply a year's electricity to 4,600 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 42,628 homes. There is also 187 MW of wind running here on the local network. If that gets switched off, no national record shows it.
Ranks 215 of 650 for clean power approved and not built.
What is stuck, and why
| Project and developer | Tech | Size | Why it is stuck |
|---|---|---|---|
| Corshellach Battery Energy StorageRES Limited | Battery | 50 MW | Cannot connect to the grid until 2027, 3 years after it was approvedWho can move it: the grid operator (NESO) and SSEN Transmission · earliest connection 2027 · planning ref 24/01073/APP |
| Simpsons Malt Limited BiomassSimpsons Malt Limited | Biomass (dedicated) | 16 MW | Under constructionWho can move it: the developer · earliest connection 2027 (in construction) · planning ref 23/01642/FUL |
| Wooperton Station, Wooperton - Solar FarmA&J Scott | Solar | 5.6 MW2,000 homes | Under constructionWho can move it: the developer · earliest connection 2027 (in construction) · planning ref 23/00545/RENE |
| Quotient Sciences, Taylor Drive - Solar PV Panel ArrayThe Duke of Northumberland Estate | Solar | 4 MW1,500 homes | Approved 3 years ago — nothing has happened sinceWho can move it: the developer and the network company · planning ref 22/03576/RENE |
| Ellington South Site, Lynemouth Solar ArrayThe Coal Authority | Solar | 1.2 MW400 homes | Approved 3 years ago — nothing has happened sinceWho can move it: the developer and the network company · planning ref 21/01380/FUL |
Compared with its neighbours
| Constituency | Approved, not built | Running | Paid to switch off |
|---|---|---|---|
| North Northumberland | 13 MW | 187 MW | not visible |
| Hexham | 23 MW | 56 MW | not visible |
| Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk | 85 MW | 685 MW | £7.0m |
| Blyth and Ashington | 150 MW | 32 MW | not visible |
Blyth and Ashington next door has 150 MW waiting, more than North Northumberland's 13 MW.
The rest of the briefing
- Every approval each project still needs, and which of them the public can see
- What building them would mean here — community payments, business rates and construction work
- 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
Everything above needs no account, and neither does the full seat page, the method or this constituency's raw data. The account covers the packaged briefing and its PDF, and nothing else.