NO TO SOLAR ON FARMLAND

The first consultation period on the proposed South Brooks Solar Farm, recently announced by EDF and PS Renewables, opened on 18 September, 2025. Taking up to 2,700 acres of both fertile farm land and lower grade land around Lydd and Greatstone, this could become the largest solar and BESS project proposed for Romney Marsh to date.

The third scheme proposed in less than a year will push the amount of farm land optioned for solar/BESS schemes on Romney Marsh to around 5300 acres - 8.3 square miles - nearly 10% of the whole area. This is equivalent to  the size of about 3 Gatwick Airports. It joins South Kent Energy Park and Shepway Energy Park in the race to industrialise much of the unique and historic Romney Marsh for the sake of the government's Net Zero targets. 

While some of the land optioned for the South Brooks Solar scheme is not productive farm land, it abutts designated areas around Dungeness including SSSI and Ramsar sites. Site A of the South Brooks solar/Bess scheme also directly borders prime farm land that Low Carbon has optioned for its 1500 acre South Kent Energy Park which is almost all top grade, high yield, best and most versatile land. 

The two schemes would create 6.5 square miles of sprawling solar panels and battery storage across the south of Romney Marsh engulfing the hamlets, villages and towns of Old Romney, Midley and Lydd and pushing up against Hope All Saints, New Romney and Greatstone.

Hands Off Our Marsh believes that ecologically protected land should not be threatened and Best and Most Versatile farm land should be protected from development just as it has been since the 1960s. The government's current mad dash Net Zero policies put food security and rural stability, as enshrined in the post-war 1947 Agriculture Act, at risk.

Read our press release. Sign the petition opposing South Brooks Solar Farm.