28 CONTEXT 178 : DECEMBER 2023 BEN COWELL Power houses With the climate crisis creating a desperate need to adopt renewable energy technologies, it should be made easier to install solar panels on or in the vicinity of listed structures. A country house owner in the middle of the Derbyshire Peak District sought to take advantage of his property’s flat roof by installing a small rooftop solar array. The panels would be relatively modest in size and anyway would be hidden from sight by the turrets that decorate the top of the building. What objections could there possibly be to such a green initiative? Many months later, and after much to-ing and fro-ing between the owner and the planning authority, the solar installation was finally permitted. By then, the cost of the work had increased by thousands of pounds because of the delays caused when the planning authority initially declined to give its support to the proposal. Among other things, the owner had been forced to create photomontages to show how the solar panels would not impinge on the beauty of the view for walkers as they descended a nearby footpath. Solar panels on roofs can be controversial, as the recent case of King’s College Chapel in Cambridge has shown all too publicly (see John Preston’s ‘A world-wide precedent for solar panels?’, Context 176, June 2023). It should be easier, not harder, to install such things on or in the vicinity of listed structures. There is huge enthusiasm among the owners and custodians of larger country houses for making their buildings more energy efficient. Athelhampton House in Dorset has become one of the first net-zero country houses, after installing heat pumps and solar panels. Ten air-source pumps help to feed the house with a steady supply of warmth. A bank of Tesla batteries stores any surplus power generated from the solar array in the walled garden. This power can be sold back into the national grid to make a return for the property. Country houses have the potential in this way to become a distributed network of power stations, generating heat and power for local use. Walled gardens are perfect locations for solar arrays. The sun beating down on rooftops could be harvested and converted into warmth or electricity. Lake-source heat pumps could help to generate all-year-round heating. However, at present much of this potential is being squandered. Eighty-seven per cent of member properties at Historic Houses, combined with the historic property owners represented by the CLA (Country Land and Business Association), say that they have been held back from investing in their properties in this way by a planning system that is far too complex and restrictive. Athelhampton benefited from having advice from officials at Historic England, who were Rooftop solar panels at Grade II* listed Tissington Hall in Derbyshire
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