Mid Suffolk District Council has approved funding for solar car ports at the Stowmarket Leisure Centre. This will enable the council to produce energy through solar panels to help run the leisure centres, as well as provide battery storage, and a number of electric vehicle charging points.
Councillor Dan Pratt shadow environment portfolio said:
“Green councillors have been very critical of the limited public provision and small contribution that the District Council has so far made to the availability of electric vehicle charging.
This scheme is welcome in going beyond charging points to increase the council contribution to renewable electricity and bring an element of grid flexibility through battery storage.“
This latter is of particular interest to Greens as grid flexibility is the purported justification for the Eye gas-fired power station which although granted approval by Government 5 years ago as key national infrastructure, has not been built. Government is now trying to push it ahead with extra money from the bill-paying public, despite gas being the most expensive source of short-term extra power output.
“The Green Party view is that the Eye proposal is now obsolete, given shrinking costs of both renewable generation and storage of power. A gas fired intermittent power station in 2021 is environmentally and economically unsustainable. We would like to see that scheme formally scrapped.”
Concurred Councillor Andrew Stringer
EADT 2020 article https://www.eadt.co.uk/news/solar-carportst-set-to-be-built-sudbury-stowmarket-2684668
