Whistley Hill Power Station

Just to the south of Whistley Hill there is a large field full of solar panels.

Maybe 10 acres, say 50,000 square metres, 5,000 square metres of solar panel if we reckon one to every ten square metres of field, this allowing for space between the rows and the perimeter band, presumably needed to give access for vehicles and machinery needed for maintenance.

Google tells me that I might get 200 watts to the square metre, so this field, on a sunny day, should be generating of the order of 1,000 kilowatts. It also tells me that a kilowatt hour would cost me around 10p, so if we allow 5 hours a day our field is generating £500 a day. It was not clear where all the power went as I did not spot an overhead power line. Perhaps it gets fed onto the grid via the supply to some farm in the vicinity.

In any event, a good bit of cash, I would have thought a lot more that you would get from running sheep on the same land. As it happens I did spot the odd sheep in the field but I could not tell whether they were inside or outside of the six foot sheep & deer proof fence erected around the panels, visible in the illustration above - my understanding being that you ran sheep underneath both to keep the grass down and for their value in wool & meat.

The fence also came with CCTV cameras at vantage points, so what with them, the fence and the MBSS warning notice, one can only suppose that panel rustling is a better earner than sheep rustling.

PS: google also tells me that an average household might do 20,000 kilowatt hours a year, getting on for a 100 a day which seems rather a lot. Five one bar electric fires on all day every day? Perhaps someone out there can offer a spreadsheet about all this stuff.

Reference 1: http://www.mbssuk.com/. Intelligence led security: '... with this growing demand, more and more companies are offering security for Solar farms but here at MBSS, we offer a one stop solution for all your security needs. When embarking on building a Solar farm you will very quickly recognise that the list of suppliers gets bigger and bigger. Security itself could have three or four different suppliers...'.