£5m solar farm due to be finished this year

Chris Ambler, chief executive of Jersey Electricity, said the solar farm would be finished by the end of 2024

The first solar farm in the Channel Islands will be finished by the end of the year, Jersey Electricity (JE) has said.

The power provider has leased an 11-acre site on St Clement fields where it is setting up nearly 7,500 solar panels.

JE said the solar farm had cost about £5m to build and would provide electricity to 600 or 700 homes.

Chris Ambler, chief executive of JE, said the power would be distributed through the island's grid network.

The solar farm will provide electricity to 600 or 700 homes

Mr Ambler said the cost of the power generated by the panels would be "a little higher" than importing it from France, but he believed solar farms were "part of the solution" to keeping energy costs down.

He said: "The strategy is to build more of these developments to find ways of reducing the cost so it becomes more attractive to buy local."

Mr Ambler said the solar farm in St Clement was one of four potential solar sites in the island.

He said the St Clement fields were being leased from former potato farmers and were "low-grade agricultural land that can't be used for anything else".

"There has been some complaints about noise... but once this facility is built it will be quiet, relatively hidden and producing a material proportion of the parish's energy requirements," he said.

Peter Hargreaves opposed the solar farm when the plans were first announced in 2022

Peter Hargreaves, who lives near the site, opposed the installation of solar panels in St Clement when the plans were first announced.

He said he still had reservations about the farm.

"I am still not sure about putting solar panels here and other places, like at Sorel, said Mr Hargreaves.

"It seems to me there are still better opportunities, ultimately in wind and with panels on top of car parks, as there are a lot of in France."

Jeremy Hughes will graze his sheep underneath the solar panels

Jeremy Hughes said he contacted JE in 2022 to ask whether he could use the solar farm to graze his 120 sheep.

He said: "Sheep and solar go really well together, it's a great partnership.

"The sheep really enjoy the shade and the shelter that the solar panels bring and the sheep graze the grass and keep it nice and short which means the panels stay very efficient."

Mr Hughes said "solar shepherding" was completely new to Jersey but he hoped it would bring more lamb to Jersey markets.

"I think times are changing and we have to adapt," he said.