The recent news that a 29MW solar farm in Wokingham has had it's grid connection date reduced by 10 years highlights a major issue for our net-zero targets. Sure, it's great news for this particular project, however knowing that so many other projects at advanced stages of development are having to wait over 10 years to be built is unbelievably frustrating. 

One of the many benefits of solar is that it can be super quick to deploy, especially compared to centralised power plants like the Hinkley Point C nuclear power station! Construction started 7 years ago and is still years off completion!

Grid connections are clearly an incredibly complex issue but one that needs to be a top priority if we are to achieve our net-zero goals. 

Last month the Energy Networks Association set out their new plan that could unlock 139GW of network capacity by 2035. This includes a “first ready, first connected” process. We need a combined industry approach in order to significantly reduce the time to get projects online.