Councillors from Essex County Council and Castle Point Borough Council visited Hadleigh Country Park, where solar panels have recently been installed.
Essex County Council (ECC) councillors Peter Schwier, Graham Butland and Mark Durham were joined by Castle Point Borough Council councillors Jillian Reeves, Jacqui Thornton and Andy Thornton during the visit.
The installation at Hadleigh Country Park is part of a long-standing project that has seen us install solar panels across Essex. To date we have installed over 50 different solar panel installations across maintained schools and other ECC buildings. These have seen over 2,500 individual solar panels installed.
As a result, our buildings have generated a total of over one million kilowatt hours (kWh) of electric. This is due to go beyond one and a half million kWh this year. It is expected this will save close to £1 million and prevent over 280 tonnes of CO2 emissions being released into the atmosphere.
All solar installs can be monitored by us in order to track savings, as well as monitor any potential issues.
Speaking of the visit, Essex County Council Climate Czar, Cllr Peter Schwier said: “The solar panels installed at Hadleigh Country Park signify the outstanding work Essex County Council is doing by putting into effect our Climate Action Plan which aims to reduce the county’s carbon footprint.
“It shows great progress that is being made as we are continuing work to achieve our goal of being a net zero county by 2050.”
The solar panels at Hadleigh Country Park were part funded by the Public Sector Decarbonisation Scheme which was made available to public sector buildings by Salix.
To date, Essex County Council have spent roughly £600,000 installing solar panels on council buildings.