North Durham
North Durham has 28 MW of renewables running, enough for 21,000 homes over a year, and nothing large waiting in the planning queue. 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, £4.0m across the constituency's 43,950 homes. There is also 21 MW of wind running here on the local network. If that gets switched off, no national record shows it.
Ranks 437 of 650 for clean power approved and not built.
What is stuck, and why
| Project and developer | Tech | Size | Why it is stuck |
|---|---|---|---|
| Edge Lane, Maiden Law - Solar Farm & Battery StorageLightsource BP | 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 DM/22/01769/FPA |
| Edge Lane, Maiden Law - Solar Farm & Battery StorageLightsource BP | Battery | 45 MW | Approved less than a year ago — nothing has happened sinceWho can move it: the developer and the network company · planning ref DM/22/01769/FPA |
| Maiden, Annfield Plain - Energy StorageStephenson Mohl Development | Battery | 38 MW | Approved 5 years ago — nothing has happened sinceWho can move it: the developer and the network company · planning ref DM/21/01583/FPA |
| Wagtail Lane, Craghead - Solar PanelsAmpyr Energy UK Development Limited | Solar | 27 MW9,800 homes | Refused by County Durham Council in 2025Who can move it: County Durham Council · planning ref DM/24/03466/FPA |
Compared with its neighbours
| Constituency | Approved, not built | Running | Paid to switch off |
|---|---|---|---|
| North Durham | 0.9 MW | 28 MW | not visible |
| City of Durham | 1.1 MW | 34 MW | not visible |
| Bishop Auckland | 52 MW | 8 MW | not visible |
| Hexham | 23 MW | 56 MW | not visible |
| Houghton and Sunderland South | 2.4 MW | 11 MW | not visible |
| Washington and Gateshead South | 26 MW | 16 MW | not visible |
Bishop Auckland next door has 52 MW waiting, more than North Durham's 0.9 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.