Can you help in fight to save Romney Marsh from extreme solar development?

The Fifth Continent, or Romney Marsh, is under threat possibly more than ever before.

This wonderful area, with its astonishing landscapes, history and wildlife, its place in tradition, legend and lore, could be destroyed by an eye-watering level of solar-farm industrialisation.

There are three proposals – Shepway Energy Park, South Brooks Solar Farm and South Kent Energy Park, together covering some 6,100 acres (2,470 hectares), or an extraordinary 10 per cent of the wider-defined Marsh area – that, if granted permission, would change one the country’s most revered landscapes forever.

Aside from the damage to landscapes, habitats and communities, the schemes would affect substantial areas of productive agricultural land, including areas of Best and Most Versatile farmland.

We do not object to the transition to renewable energy, but we want our government to prioritise solar-energy expansion on rooftops, car parks, commercial buildings and brownfield sites. Where large renewable-energy infrastructure projects do go ahead, we want communities to have a meaningful voice and to benefit fairly and properly from hosting such imposing schemes.

Most importantly, though, we want the cumulative impact of all three Romney Marsh schemes properly assessed, rather than each development considered essentially in isolation.

Ultimately, we want to protect Romney Marsh from industrialisation. To put it another way… we want to save Romney Marsh.

CPRE Kent are working with Hands Off Our Marsh (HOOM) and engaging with organisations including the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, Kent Wildlife Trust and Buglife to highlight the potential cumulative impact of the proposed schemes.

However, effective participation in the process of deciding on such large infrastructure projects requires specialist knowledge. We need access to independent ecological and environmental expertise and, as these proposals progress through the planning process, specialist planning and legal advice.

This will help us scrutinise the developers’ evidence, understand the cumulative effects of the three schemes and ensure that the potential impacts on Romney Marsh and its communities are properly represented.

And that expertise is of course going to cost money. To that end, HOOM has set up a CrowdJustice page entitled ‘Hands off our Marsh – Save Romney Marsh from Mega Solar’ in a bid to raise funds for the challenge ahead.

Can you help? Can you spare some money, however small the total, to join the fight to save Romney Marsh. If you feel you can, please click here

Thank you.