Warm Homes Coalition

We have joined the WarmHomesLeics coalition, led by Climate Action Leicester and Leicestershire, along with other groups including The Race Equality Centre, Loughborough Climate Vigil and Muslim Green Guardians. This is part of a national campaign calling on the government to do the following:

• Roll out a street-by-street insulation programme
• Provide targeted financial help for people in fuel poverty
• Act to switch the UK to cheap, home-grown renewable energy
• Stop providing support for the fossil fuel industry

Find out more about how you can get involved here. 

Supporting Stoneshollow Solar Farm

A speaker from JBM Solar came to our last meeting to tell us about their proposal to build a solar farm between Barlestone and Nailstone in Leicestershire. The planned solar farm would provide clean energy for 22,000 homes, while also managing the site to improve biodiversity. 

After the meeting, we spent some time reading the planning documents and we also visited the site before deciding to support the planning application. You can find our letter to Hinckley & Bosworth Borough Council planning committee below.

If you have time before 10th May, we encourage you to visit the online planning application and submit a supportive comment. (You have to register, but it only takes a moment.) Short comments will still make a difference! You could use some of our points below or just write a couple of sentences about why you want to see more renewable energy being generated.

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RE: 21/01395/FUL | Installation and operation of solar farm at Church Farm, Washpit Lane, Barlestone, Nuneaton, Leicestershire CV13 0EH

 

Dear Planning Committee,

We are writing to express our support for the above planning application.

We were pleased to see that Hinckley & Bosworth Borough Council passed a motion to recognise the climate emergency in July 2019[1]. At the time, you noted that urgent action was required to limit the effects of global warming on people around the world. In the almost three years that have passed since then, the situation has only become clearer. There have been more extreme weather events, with wild fires, floods and hurricanes devastating communities in many countries. Currently, the dangerous heatwave in India[2] and the prolonged drought in Kenya[3] are both threatening lives. The latest report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change[4] provides a stark warning that carbon emissions need to start falling very soon if we are to avoid an unliveable future for large parts of the planet. We cannot continue to rely on fossil fuels for energy.

We have spent some time learning more about the proposal for a solar farm between Barlestone and Nailstone before making a decision that we would support the planning application. We met the project manager, Robin Johnson, and asked a lot of questions about why the site was chosen and how it would be managed when the solar panels are installed. We visited the site ourselves to look at the condition of the soil and the species of plants that are present. Finally, we also looked into some of the national debate about solar farms.

We are now convinced that this site is appropriate for a solar farm to generate clean energy and that the proposed management will lead to an increase in biodiversity.

Solar panels provide the cheapest electricity in history, according to the International Energy Agency[5]. They can be installed quickly, in contrast to fossil fuel or nuclear power plants. When generating, they make no noise and create no pollution. They do not require imported fuels to operate, instead using a source of energy available to everyone. They require only small amounts of maintenance. When they are no longer needed, solar farms can be decommissioned without leaving behind lasting damage. The site could be returned to agriculture, hopefully with restored soils. In a climate emergency, and when we are facing a cost-of-living crisis with rapidly increasing energy prices, we should be rolling out as many solar panels as possible in the UK.

The soil of the chosen site appears to be depleted, making it unsuitable for agriculture without large chemical inputs. This use of fertiliser and pesticides has severely limited the biodiversity of plant life. On our visit, we saw a small number of mainly nitrogen-hungry species growing in the hedgerow, which will support a limited range of insect and bird life. Removing these chemical inputs and seeding the fields with meadow flowers, as well as planting more trees and hedges, should significantly improve the habitat.

We were pleased to see that JBM Solar also plan to support the local community by making the solar farm accessible to walkers to appreciate the wildlife, providing educational facilities on site and supplying rooftop solar panels for community buildings. If this planning application is passed, as we very much hope it will be, we look forward to visiting in future to see the quiet generation of clean energy and the improved natural habitat.

Yours faithfully,

Hannah Wakley
Co-ordinator
on behalf of Leicester Friends of the Earth 

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[1] Climate emergency declared by Hinckley & Bosworth Borough Council | Hinckley & Bosworth Borough Council (hinckley-bosworth.gov.uk)

[2] Heat wave in India leaves millions struggling to cope - BBC News

[3] Kenya, neighbours stare at possible famine - warns lobby (the-star.co.ke)

[4] IPCC_AR6_WGIII_SummaryForPolicymakers.pdf

[5] Solar is now ‘cheapest electricity in history’, confirms IEA (carbonbrief.org)

Clean up the banks!

To highlight that the banks are investing enormous amounts of their customers’ money in dirty fossil fuels, we staged a cleaning flash mob at branches of Barclays, HSBC, Santander and Natwest in Leicester city centre.



We wore our cleaning clothes and brought dusters, brushes and polishing cloths to symbolically clean up the banks. While some of us cleaned, Melanie Wakley explained why we were there with a loud hailer:

“Scientists tell us that we’ve got 11 years left to take action if we want to avoid irreversible changes to the climate.

Runaway climate change would be an unthinkable disaster – it would mean drought, floods, extreme heatwaves and sea level rises. The poorest people would be the worst affected and it would become impossible for humans to live on parts of the planet.

We need to be investing in clean energy and a liveable planet. It’s time for these banks to move their customers’ money out of fossil fuels.”

Outside the banks, we also spoke to customers about how they can move their money out of dirty energy.



Between 2016 and 2018, Barclays invested $85.1 billion in fossil fuels; they are one of the top investors in oil mining. In the same period, HSBC invested $57.8 billion in dirty energy, including tar sands, Arctic drilling, coal mining and fracking. Santander have increased their investment in fossil fuels since the Paris Agreement to tackle climate change was signed in 2015, investing $14.9 billion in dirty energy in three years.



Following a meeting with a member of Leicester Friends of the Earth last week, Leicester East MP, Keith Vaz, signed a cross-party letter to the prime minister in support of onshore wind energy. Onshore wind turbines are now the cheapest source of energy in the UK. They are also hugely popular, with over three quarters of the public backing their use, according to the government’s own statistics. However, since 2015, the government has introduced planning and financial barriers that have stood in the way of new projects. The campaigners are hoping that Leicester’s other MPs, Jon Ashworth and Liz Kendall, will also sign the letter and support clean energy.

Festival of Renewable Energy

We held our third protest outside Barclays on Humberstone Gate on Saturday 6th May to express our opposition to the bank's investment in dirty energy. We celebrated clean, renewable energy and called on the bank to move their money and invest in a sustainable future.  

Members of Leicester Friends of the Earth and Leicestershire Against Onshore Drilling organised the ‘Festival of Renewable Energy’ to show Barclays where they should invest their customers’ money and tell them to stop funding shale gas extraction in Yorkshire. Barclays own 97% of Third Energy, the company that is planning to frack in Kirby Misperton, where the community are strongly opposed to having dirty energy extraction on their doorstep.

The festival began with an unannounced flash mob inside the bank. Red Leicester Choir walked into the bank quietly and then suddenly began singing a version of ‘Bella Ciao’, calling for action on climate change. At the end of the song, campaigners unfurled a giant banner that read ‘Toxic Bank’. The flash mob was streamed live on Leicester Friends of the Earth’s Facebook page and the video has since been shared widely on social media. Red Leicester Choir then sang several other songs about fracking and climate change outside the bank.

During the day, we talked to Barclays customers, to ask them if they realise that their money is invested in dirty energy, and asked passers-by to sign a petition calling for a moratorium on fracking. Children were invited to make a paper windmill and everyone was able to dress up in the anti-fracking selfie kit and take photos to spread awareness on social media. During the afternoon, a giant model wind turbine was constructed, to show Barclays where they should invest their money.

Renewable energy is growing around the world, particularly wind and solar. In many countries, solar is now cheaper than fossil fuels and prices are predicted to keep falling. A 100% clean energy future is possible and it should be our goal.

Here in the UK, we have colossal renewable energy resources from wind, wave and sun. We are already the world leader in offshore wind power and there is huge potential for growth. There are half a million solar installations on UK rooftops, which is creating jobs and boosting the economy.

We ask Barclays to invest their customers’ money in a clean, sustainable future