Witney
Witney has 48 MW of clean power (all solar) approved and still not built: enough to supply a year's electricity to 17,000 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, £3.7m across the constituency's 40,272 homes.
Ranks 146 of 650 for clean power approved and not built.
What is stuck, and why
| Project and developer | Tech | Size | Why it is stuck |
|---|---|---|---|
| Witney Bypass, Stanton Harcourt Road - Battery StorageVoltwise Power Holdings Limited | Battery | 150 MW | Waiting 12 months for a planning decisionWho can move it: West Oxfordshire Council · planning ref 25/01656/FUL |
| Willowfields Energy Park, Marcham - Solar PanelsExagen Development Limited | Solar | 50 MW18,000 homes | Waiting 19 months for a planning decisionWho can move it: Vale of White Horse Council · planning ref P24/V2698/FUL |
| Aston Road, Aston - Solar Panels & Battery Energy Storage SystemAmpyr Solar Europe | Solar | 40 MW15,000 homes | Waiting 12 months for a planning decisionWho can move it: West Oxfordshire Council · planning ref 25/01702/FUL |
| Aston Road, Aston - Solar Panels & Battery Energy Storage SystemAmpyr Solar Europe | Battery | 40 MW | Waiting 12 months for a planning decisionWho can move it: West Oxfordshire Council · planning ref 25/01702/FUL |
| Snowswick Lane, Coleshill - Solar FarmAbei Energy Limited | Solar | 40 MW14,000 homes | Applied in 2025, still waiting for a decisionWho can move it: Vale of White Horse Council · planning ref P25/V1646/FUL |
| Ducklington Solar FarmNovus Renewable Services / Innova Renewables | Solar | 36 MW13,000 homes | Under constructionWho can move it: the developer · earliest connection 2027 (in construction) · planning ref 21/01236/FUL |
| Quarry Solar Farm & Battery Storage FacilityRWE | Solar | 35 MW13,000 homes | Approved a year ago — nothing has happened sinceWho can move it: the developer and the network company · planning ref 24/01565/FUL |
| Quarry Solar Farm & Battery Storage FacilityJBM Solar Projects 34 Limited | Battery | 35 MW | Approved a year ago — nothing has happened sinceWho can move it: the developer and the network company · planning ref 24/01565/FUL |
| Snowswick Lane, Coleshill - Solar FarmAbei Energy Limited | Battery | 25 MW | Applied in 2025, still waiting for a decisionWho can move it: Vale of White Horse Council · planning ref P25/V1646/FUL |
| Akeman Solar Park & Battery StorageBritish Solar Renewables | Solar | 20 MW7,300 homes | Refused by West Oxfordshire Council in 2025Who can move it: West Oxfordshire Council · planning ref 25/00234/FUL |
| Willowfields Energy Park, Marcham - Battery Energy StorageExagen Development Limited | Battery | 20 MW | Waiting 19 months for a planning decisionWho can move it: Vale of White Horse Council · planning ref P24/V2698/FUL |
| Shilton Road - Solar ParkEcotricity Generation Limited | Solar | 8 MW2,900 homes | Approved 3 years ago — nothing has happened sinceWho can move it: the developer and the network company · planning ref 22/02472/FUL |
Plus 3 smaller projects — see the full seat page.
Compared with its neighbours
| Constituency | Approved, not built | Running | Paid to switch off |
|---|---|---|---|
| Witney | 48 MW | 61 MW | not visible |
| Newbury | 5.4 MW | 18 MW | not visible |
| East Wiltshire | 2.3 MW | 63 MW | not visible |
| Swindon North | 58 MW | 105 MW | not visible |
| Banbury | 10 MW | 20 MW | not visible |
| Didcot and Wantage | 103 MW | 121 MW | not visible |
Didcot and Wantage next door has 103 MW waiting, more than Witney's 48 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.