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Lark Energy completes solar farm at Hanson Cement plant

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World Cement,


Lark Energy, in partnership with Armstrong Energy, has successfully completed and connected a 9 MWp solar farm at Hanson Cement’s Ketton plant in Rutland. This is the first phase of the project, with a further 3 MWp to be built later this year.

The solar farm was constructed on a former quarry site belonging to the cement company. The 38 544 modules (located on a 20 ha piece of land) will generate enough energy to cover around 10% of the cement plant’s annual consumption.

The project was jointly developed by Lark Energy and Armstrong Energy with the latter providing funding partly through an innovative PPA arrangement with Hanson. The company will receive a proportion of the energy for free with the remainder being provided at a market reflective rate.

The project also required a pioneering approach to managing the grid connection. The power from the solar farm connects into Hanson’s private 11 kv network, which is itself connected to Western Power Distribution’s 33 kv network. Lark Energy has designed the solar farm to enable active and reactive power management and to protect the grid from reverse current. This has a number of advantages, including minimising the need for costly 33 kv upgrade work, reducing the energy costs for Hanson and enabling the inverters to be used as capacitor batteries at night.

The solar farm was officially opened by Hanson’s CEO Patrick O’Shea. Lark Energy’s Managing Director Jonathan Selwyn and Andrew Newman, Director of Armstrong Energy were also in attendance.

“It has been very rewarding for the Hanson Renewable Energy Team to see the first of their projects come to fruition with the switch on of the Hanson Cement Solar Farm at Ketton,” said Mark Cox of Hanson Cement. “This is the first of what is hoped are many such projects the company will be involved in over the coming years as we strive to reduce our CO2 emissions and energy costs”

Jonathan Selwyn, Managing Director of Lark Energy commented, “We are delighted to have worked with Hanson Cement and Armstrong Energy to develop this innovative solar project. Large scale solar is perfectly suited to projects such as this on previously used industrial land and where all the energy can be utilised directly by nearby businesses. We look forward to working on some further projects like this in the coming months.”

Steve Mahon, Director of Armstrong Energy, added: “Armstrong Energy prides itself on being creative in structuring a deal to ensure all sides benefit. This project with Hanson and Lark Energy is an exemplar of this approach and includes an innovative power sales agreement that builds a sustainable market advantage for the host. We believe this approach can be used with large energy users both in the UK and overseas and we look forward to a long and successful partnership with both Hanson and Lark Energy.”


Adapted from Lark Energy press release by

Read the article online at: https://www.worldcement.com/europe-cis/07052014/hanson_cement_completes_first_phase_of_solar_farm_147/

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