Isle of Cumbrae Community Council to protest massive solar farm proposed to be built in popular beauty spot

Cumbrae Community Council are hosting a protest this weekend as a controversial solar farm has been proposed to be built in a popular beauty spot.

Described as ‘highly contentious’, the proposal would see a massive solar farm built at the highest point of Cumbrae - a popular beauty spot for both locals and tourists alike. The community council has been fighting proposals to cultivate green energy on the island since 2016 - as they argue the proposals bring ‘no benefit to the local community’.

The protest will go ahead tomorrow, Saturday February 25, in which islanders will climb to the top of the Cumbrae and put umbrellas up - meant to signify to developers that this site is ‘not the place’ for the solar farm.

The planned solar farm is the size of 22 football pitches and would cover 1.3% of the total area of the island - according to the Cumbrae Community Council.

Comsol Energy Limited have been trying to get a solar farm built on Cumbrae for the last seven years - initially proposing a 5MW scheme in 2016 which was rejected as all power was to be taken off the island and fed into the national grid.

Comsol Energy withdrew an application to North Ayrshire Council in July of 2022 after 263 comments (96 per cent of which were objections to the proposal) were left on the planning application.

At the end of 2022, Comsol held an exhibition signalling their intent to submit yet another planning application, this time including battery energy storage systems and associated infrastructure, giving a total output of 19MW. According to the Cumbrae Community Council, no Environmental Impact Assesment was carried out despite protests from the Cumbrae Community Council and local MSP’s.

In response the community council says the local communities views are being ‘completely ignored’.

A spokesperson for the community council said:“The rush to go for green energy is being used to push through a poorly-thought out proposal for a highly-contentious solar farm which will blight a beauty spot on the Isle of Cumbrae.

“Ironically, the proposed site looks across the Clyde towards the proposed XLCC Factory site, one of the largest buildings in Scotland which will manufacture undersea cables to transport solar energy from Morocco to the UK. Compared to this, the logic for building a solar farm on an island where it rains 183 days a year seems highly questionable.

“An Environmental Impact Assessment would trigger important questions such as whether an alternative site might have less environmental impact than the current proposal, which is adjacent to the main viewing point and picnic area on the island and is within the Great Cumbrae Special Landscape Area and the Barbay Hill Local Nature Conservation Site.

“While we support the move to a carbon neutral island and we are in favour of renewable energy, we have serious concerns about this particular application. Surely a proper assessment should be carried out to work out whether a solar farm is right for our island, and, if so, whether this is the best location.

“That doesn’t seem to be much to ask when the proposal affects such a huge area of our island. We rely on tourism for a significant portion of our economy and the solar farm will blight one of our main beauty spots.

“We are concerned that the Carbon Neutral Islands project will be used to force this project on us whether it is right for the island or not.”