Floating Solar Panels

Neil Hudson Excerpts

Thursday 26th June 2025 Commons Chamber

[Lincoln Jopp]

My hon. Friend pre-empts one of the many benefits of floating solar that I will highlight to the House. He remembers his physics highers well, because the placing of floating solar reduces evaporation from the body that is covered by 70%. Given that the vast majority of the water in our reservoirs is lost through evaporation every year, we will save a great deal more water if the Government decide to pursue this technology at a grand scale.

Part of my coming here today is to speak to two large constituencies within this House. There are 543 constituencies that contain reservoirs or man-made water sources. Similarly, countless Members from across the House have very difficult decisions to make about putting solar farms on good agricultural land. Essentially, what has happened is that the whole discussion in this area has become a zero-sum game. It is a battle between food security and energy security, and there has seemed to be no way of unpicking that—until now.

Globally, floating solar has been put to practical application at large scale in China, India and Vietnam. The UK was formerly a leader in this space, because on the Queen Elizabeth II reservoir in 2016, a grand technology demonstrator was put on and plugged in, and it has been banging out 6.3 MW into Thames Water’s water treatment facility ever since. That is enough to power 2,000 homes. Given that floating solar covers less than 10% of that reservoir, I am sure that hon. Members can see the vast potential.

I want to talk about some of the benefits of floating solar, because they are legion. First, as hon. Members will have worked out already, there is the removal of the opportunity cost of putting floating solar panels on grade A agricultural land. If we do not have to put them all over Lincolnshire and we can put them on reservoirs, that land can be used for growing food.

[Dr Neil Hudson (Epping Forest) (Con)]

My hon. and gallant Friend is talking about the use of prime agricultural land, and food security is part of national security, as is energy security and, indeed, water security. However, there is a huge trend of prime agricultural land being devoted to solar plants, including in my constituency of Epping Forest, where a new plan is about to go in for a 237-acre plot between Thornwood and Epping Upland. He is articulating alternatives for the placing of solar panels, and there are plenty of such places up and down the land—brownfield sites, reservoirs, railway sidings, rooftops of agricultural buildings—so does he agree that we must protect prime farmland and the green belt, and make sure that solar panels go in the right places?

[Lincoln Jopp]

I completely agree with my hon. Friend. I hope we are going to give hope across the House and therefore across the country that this alternative solution to putting solar panels on grade A agricultural land is, to a certain extent, an answer to a maiden’s prayers. Not only does floating solar remove the opportunity costs of putting it on agricultural land, but one of its beauties is that it is twice as efficient as a land-based system. Land-based systems warm up because they are on the land, and as they warm up they become less efficient, whereas floating solar panels, because of the evaporative effect on the underside, remain automatically cool and 100% efficient throughout a sunny day.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lincoln Jopp]

On Tuesday, I visited the Queen Elizabeth II reservoir, which is a closed site owned by Thames Water. I am not aware that there were any fish there, but there was certainly bird life. It is important to make the point that the general planning norm and all the modelling have been based on covering only 15% of these reservoirs, in order to leave sufficient space for leisure use, including fishing, no doubt, and for bird life. The birds I saw on the Queen Elizabeth II on Tuesday were warming themselves very happily on the floating solar panels, because, of course, by being on the panels, they are predator free, as nothing can attack them there.

“How big could this be?”, I hear the House roar.

[Dr Hudson]

How big could this be?

[Lincoln Jopp]

I thank my hon. Friend for that.

The installed base of every single solar panel in the United Kingdom is producing 17 GW. If we were to cover 15% of man-made reservoirs in this country, we would double the national capacity, adding a further 16 GW without touching an inch of agricultural land. That is absolutely extraordinary. In so doing, we would create 80,000 jobs in the construction phase and 8,000 jobs in the maintenance phase.

My plea to the Minister—who I know is putting the finishing touches to the Government’s solar road map—is that floating solar should play a much greater part in the final road map than it did in the first draft. I am grateful to my right hon. and hon. Friends for their support; I hope this debate has been educational and informative, and that they are now fully signed up to the floating solar brethren and sisterhood, which will go forth from this place and evangelise for the good cause.

Oral Answers to Questions

Neil Hudson Excerpts

Tuesday 16th April 2024 Commons Chamber

[Justin Tomlinson]

It is an important point. As a proud electric car driver, I have concerns that not all people have equal access to charging, which I have on the driveway to my house. I was therefore thrilled when the Government managed to deliver a 50% increase in EV charging points in the last year alone.

[Dr Neil Hudson (Penrith and The Border) (Con)]

Energy security is national security, and food security is national security. Up and down the country there are plenty of rooftops, residential, industrial and agricultural, that are suitable for solar panels. Will my hon. Friend the Minister reassure the country that we will prioritise those sites for our solar footprint, rather than jeopardising prime food-producing land or, indeed, our precious greenbelt?

[Andrew Bowie]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Food security and energy security are both vital, which is why the UK solar taskforce identified the need to address barriers relating to rooftop solar deployment, including access to finance as a priority. The rooftop subgroup was established to focus specifically on this area, and we are exploring options to facilitate low-cost finance from retail lenders to help households and businesses with the up-front cost of solar installation on rooftops.

Planning and Solar Farms

Neil Hudson Excerpts

Wednesday 19th July 2023 Westminster Hall

[Dr Johnson]

My hon. Friend is right that if these applications are of the size decided by local authorities, a local plan in place can enable a local authority to made decisions based on what it wants locally, rather than what it is told to do. My hon. Friend is right that a local plan can be very helpful when dealing with a smaller application.

I was informed yesterday that there are 12 NSIP applications currently in process in Lincolnshire for large solar farms, including Beacon Fen, Springwell, Heckington Fen and Fosse Green Energy, which all appear in my constituency. I am also reliably informed that there are a further two NSIP solar applications in the pipeline for North Kesteven. However, it is notable that as of yesterday there is only one small-scale application to our local council. The Government need to reflect on why they have created a planning system for solar panels that drives applications off the NSIP scale, as we have so many NSIPs in Lincolnshire and so few small applications.

As we have just heard, through NSIPs, local people have decision-making power taken away from them rather than given to them. The upgrade of substations on the electrical network, such as the ones in Navenby, should be a positive enhancement to local infrastructure, but in practice it has acted as a magnet for speculators seeking to cash in. Where substations have been upgraded, we get a cluster of large solar farm applications near to them, as it is cheaper for the companies that want to build them. As a result, instead of a large number of small, low-impact solar farms, we get a small number of gigantic industrial farms, which utterly ruin the landscape, in some cases choking entire villages of potential future expansion and turning what has traditionally been a food-producing haven into a vast glimmering desert.

[Dr Neil Hudson (Penrith and The Border) (Con)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing this important debate. On her point about food-producing land, the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee is just finishing a food security inquiry, and one of the key areas we looked at was land use. Solar has a big part to play in our energy mix, but we must be careful of the unintended consequences of taking prime food-producing land and the greenbelt out and replacing it with these installations. It is similar to the trees debate: we must have the right trees in the right places. We should have the right solar panels in the right places. Does my hon. Friend agree that there are right places to put them, including the many roofs across the country, and not least those on agricultural buildings?

[Dr Johnson]

I could not agree with my hon. Friend more. In some respects, he has paraphrased my speech into a few sentences very eloquently, so I thank him. I ask the Minister to ensure that when the Government improve infrastructure they do not destroy the countryside in the process. The scale of these applications is quite difficult to imagine from a map alone, though I see that my right hon. Friend the Member for Gainsborough (Sir Edward Leigh) has brought a map with him today. Each covers around 2,000 or more acres—that is just over 3 square miles. Some of these NSIP applications are larger than that, sometimes substantially.

I would also like to raise the threat of glint and glare from light reflecting off solar panels. In Lincolnshire this is especially significant due to the presence of the RAF. The Red Arrows operate from RAF Waddington, which sits on the edge of my constituency. The limestone cliff top means that the Fosse Way site that is being proposed will be an especially visible eyesore from across the constituency. Many of my constituents choose to live in a rural setting because of the superb views, which solar farms threaten to spoil entirely. The impact will also extend to house prices. Many of my constituents fear that houses with unburdened views will sell for much more, leaving residents individually out of pocket as well.

Heating Rural Homes

Neil Hudson Excerpts

Tuesday 13th June 2023 Commons Chamber

[Sir Bill Wiggin (North Herefordshire) (Con)]

It is a great pleasure to be able to address this important issue. We all want to beat climate change, cut emissions and leave the planet in a better condition than we found it, so we do need to address the challenge of heating rural homes. It is perhaps ironic that we should be discussing this topic during a heatwave, but

“pleasant as it may be to bask in the warmth of recovery… The time to repair the roof is when the sun is shining”.

As North Herefordshire is a rural constituency, I urge the Government to ensure that there is an equitable solution for heating rural homes. Around 1.1 million homes in England are not connected to the gas grid and currently use some of the most carbon-intensive heating fuels, such as oil and coal. Some rural homes do not even have the option of an electricity supply.

In the past year, we have seen the price of fuel fluctuate wildly due to Russia’s illegal and brutal invasion of Ukraine. In the wake of the invasion, heating oil hit an unprecedented 110 pence a litre, well over double the regular cost.

[Dr Neil Hudson (Penrith and The Border) (Con)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing this important debate and on highlighting how different rural areas are from urban areas. As he mentioned, so many households —up to 76%—are off grid and on things like heating oil. Does he agree that decisions made in urban Whitehall need to understand that rural areas are different? Some well-intentioned schemes, such as the sustainable warmth scheme, have not worked well in practice. There needs to be flexibility in these policies so that, when we talk about phasing out heating oil or, indeed, phasing out petrol and diesel vehicles—things that are so vital to rural areas—we can make sure the Government listen to rural areas.

[Sir Bill Wiggin]

My hon. Friend is a rural champion, like myself. With his background in animal welfare, he feels the beat of the countryside in his veins. He is absolutely right about having that rural priority for vital things such as climate change, where we all want the right things. We all want to do the best we can for our constituents, but what works in inner London is so different from that which would affect his constituents, those in Brecon and Radnorshire, or the wonderful people of North Herefordshire.

As I said, the fuel price hit an unprecedented 110 pence per litre, double the regular cost, or even more. The Government moved commendably quickly to help secure our energy supply and to protect consumers through the energy price guarantee. However, for those off grid, that support was not forthcoming. The energy price guarantee ensured that gas and electricity bills were capped at about half of what they could have been, but those using alternative fuels received a £200 payment and there was no cap on the price. As a result, they were subjected to massive price increases, with little to safeguard them from factors completely out of their control. During this period, I received emails from people in Herefordshire whose houses are off the mains grid and who were deeply concerned by the rapidly increasing price of alternative fuel.

With the UK target of reaching net zero by 2050 in mind, the Government are pursuing a heat pump-led approach to secure energy independence for the UK. Their well-meaning boiler ban, set to take effect in 2026, will force homeowners to replace their gas and oil boilers with low-carbon alternatives. Although that ban may be well-intentioned and appears to align with the target of reaching net zero by 2050, we have forgotten the impracticality of such a ban for those people living off grid. With 75% of rural properties off the gas grid, these homeowners rely on alternative heating methods. Of all the off-grid homes in the UK, 55% are heated with heating oil, just 18% with electricity, 11% with solid fuel and 10% with liquid petroleum gas. That means that 76% of off-grid households will soon have to replace their heating systems.