North Bedfordshire
North Bedfordshire has 74 MW of clean power (all solar) approved and still not built: enough to supply a year's electricity to 27,000 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 42,897 homes.
Ranks 94 of 650 for clean power approved and not built.
What is stuck, and why
| Project and developer | Tech | Size | Why it is stuck |
|---|---|---|---|
| Dunton Lane - Battery Energy Storage SystemHarmony BW Limited | Battery | 200 MW | Approved a year ago — nothing has happened sinceWho can move it: the developer and the network company · planning ref CB/24/03111/FULL |
| Dunton Lane - Battery Energy Storage SystemCentral Bedfordshire Council | Battery | 177 MW | Approved less than a year ago — nothing has happened sinceWho can move it: the developer and the network company · planning ref CB/25/00421/REG3 |
| Cobholden Battery StorageAGR Renewables | Battery | 100 MW | Approved 3 years ago — nothing has happened sinceWho can move it: the developer and the network company · planning ref 22/01828/MAF |
| Thurleigh Road - Battery Energy StoragePathfinder Clean Energy UK Dev Limited | Battery | 69 MW | Approved 3 years ago — nothing has happened sinceWho can move it: the developer and the network company · planning ref 23/01139/MAF |
| Twinwood Road Oakley And Clapham, Thurleigh Road - Solar FarmPACE Elevate Energy Limited | Solar | 50 MW18,000 homes | Approved less than a year ago — nothing has happened sinceWho can move it: the developer and the network company · planning ref 25/01292/MAF |
| Bedford Solar, Northill Road - Solar Farm & Battery StorageQC Ubertino Limited | Solar | 50 MW18,000 homes | Waiting 14 months for a planning decisionWho can move it: Bedford Council · planning ref 25/01030/MAF |
| Cobholden Solar FarmAGR Renewables | Solar | 50 MW18,000 homes | Approved a year ago — nothing has happened sinceWho can move it: the developer and the network company · planning ref 24/00858/MAF |
| Snakes Meadow - Solar FarmRenewable Connections Developments Limited / European Energy UK Ltd | Solar | 46 MW17,000 homes | Approved 2 years ago — nothing has happened sinceWho can move it: the developer and the network company · planning ref 21/02526/MAF |
| Lowfield Farm - Solar FarmRenewable Connections Developments Limited | Solar | 26 MW9,600 homes | Approved less than a year ago — nothing has happened sinceWho can move it: the developer and the network company · planning ref CB/24/03703/FULL |
| Moggerhanger Road, Sandy - Solar FarmKach Capital Estates Limited | Battery | 20 MW | Waiting 4.4 years for a planning decisionWho can move it: Central Bedfordshire Council · planning ref CB/22/00752/FULL |
| Bedford Solar, Northill Road - Solar Farm & Battery StorageQC Ubertino Limited | Battery | 15 MW | Waiting 14 months for a planning decisionWho can move it: Bedford Council · planning ref 25/01030/MAF |
| Goosey Lodge - Solar FarmWykes Engineering Limited Goosey Lodge | Solar | 10 MW3,800 homes | Approved 3 years ago — nothing has happened sinceWho can move it: the developer and the network company · planning ref 22/01520/MAF |
Plus 4 smaller projects — see the full seat page.
Compared with its neighbours
| Constituency | Approved, not built | Running | Paid to switch off |
|---|---|---|---|
| North Bedfordshire | 74 MW | 97 MW | not visible |
| South Northamptonshire | 104 MW | 85 MW | not visible |
| Hitchin | 50 MW | 33 MW | not visible |
| Mid Bedfordshire | 43 MW | 14 MW | not visible |
| Milton Keynes North | 4.2 MW | 52 MW | not visible |
| Bedford | 7 MW | 0 MW | not visible |
South Northamptonshire next door has 104 MW waiting, more than North Bedfordshire's 74 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.