By Kate Monson

There is no doubt that the Feed-in Tariff has made an impact on renewable energy generation in this country. Here at Good Energy we hit a significant milestone last week when we signed up our 1000th Feed-in Tariff customer. In the same week Ofgem revealed that more than 11 000 generators registered for the Feed-in Tariff during its first six months. That amounts to about 44MW of renewable capacity, enough to power four towns the size of Glastonbury.

And speaking of Glastonbury, Michael Eavis of festival fame recently installed 1116 solar panels on the roof of his cowshed – the one so wittily nicknamed the Mootel. The array is the largest on the roof of any farm building in the UK, and will generate enough electricity to power the equivalent of 40 homes annually, saving around 100 tonnes of carbon a year. “We had to make a major statement because [with the festival] we use so much power” Eavis told the Guardian. “This has brought us a one big step closer to our goal of operating the farm as ecologically as possible.” Watch a short film from the solar launch at Worthy Farm here.

But while Eavis is well-known for his eco-credentials, there are plenty of other farmers and landowners who are seeing harvesting sunshine as a great financial investment too. And with embattled British farmers seeking new ways to diversify, this should come as no surprise. According to a recent survey by Farming Futures, twice as many farmers (15%) are generating renewable energy compared with last year. And with over 100 planning applications for schemes in Cornwall alone – including a £40m network of solar farms, which if built would triple the UK’s current solar generating capacity – this number is likely to rise.

Our CEO Juliet Davenport spoke at a Farming Futures workshop held at the Eavis farm last week, aimed at helping farmers understand how to upgrade their building with solar. Interest from the farming community was huge. “We had to turn over 100 farmers away from this event, which shows there is a real appetite for investing in on-farm solar technology,” says Farming Futures’ Ben Tuxworth.

However, the question begging to be answered is, are we really ready to lose swathes of our green and pleasant land to hundreds of solar panels?

Firstly, as Michael Eavis and Farming Futures have illustrated, there is significant potential for arrays to be installed on existing farm buildings rather than green fields, and it is vital these potential sites are thoroughly explored. It’s also worth noting that the visual impact of a solar farm is extremely low, with panels lying close to the ground, often obscured by hedgerows, with matt rather than reflective surfaces. And as Juliet commented when discussing a proposed solar farm in Caddington, Central Bedfordife on the BBC’s Three Counties Breakfast Show last week, “The panels are silent, don’t move around, and sheep can still graze the grass around them.”

And arguably most importantly, the UK has a binding target to produce 15% of its energy from renewable resources by 2020. In order to reach this, huge changes are required across the energy sector. Increased energy generation from solar will help us towards this. But not only will it add to the country’s renewable capacity, solar generation can provide the country’s farmers with a vital additional income, in turn helping to maintain the rural and farming communities that are so quintessentially British.

Good Energy knows that the UK can reach a 100% renewable future by 2050. And we have carried out the research to prove it. Take a look at a pathway to 100% here.

Click here to read about West Mill Community Wind Farm in Oxfordshire and discover other ways that rural communities can benefit from renewable generation.