Cost of Planning Permission

[SRE]

I don't know if I'm being thick but I can't find the cost of commercial planning permission for solar panels. I've looked on the planning portal and it's not clear which permission I should be applying for - I assumed it was full (worst case scenario) and it didn't provide a price. Does anyone know how much?? I got domestic pp last year for £150 am I lucky enough to get it for the same price?

 

[Worcester]

@SRE

Have you been here: Planning Portal | 1-App

That should help, when you get the 'blank fee' click on the light grey 'Calculate' button and then it starts to ask loads of questions.

When you get to "Erection, alteration or replacement of plant or machinery"

The most important item here for large ground arrays is the area covered, since the fee is based on that! if you had a tracking array, you would need to work out the area that it swept over, if it was rows of static, then ONLY the actual area covered by the panels, the area in between if still left as grass would not be included, if you gravelled the whole area, even between the rows, that you have to include that.

If its going on a an existing flat roof with angle mounts, you'll generally need to include the whole roof area.

Hope that helps

I just did this for a farmers roof on his packing shed, (10m x 30m 28kWp) and the fee worked out at £335.

Though that isn't the real cost, that just the fees!

Now you need to take into account preparatiopn of drawings, correspondence, communication with stautory undertakers, discussion and liason with the officers, attending the planning meeting (that is if you really want it to succeed...)

 

[SRE]

Thanks for that I wasn't sure which category of planning it fell into. It seems to be £335 up to 1000m2. I've tried a few variations and they all seem to be coming up with the same cost. I'm not worried about the other parts of PP, I'm used to doing all that sort of stuff it's juts difficult working with the numpties in my planning department sometimes so I try to avoid it if I can. Did it take you long to get them passed, does it always have to go to committee?

 

[grantr37]

A large brown envelope full of Green Banknotes or Red Banknotes should keep them happy LOL....you know the ones that are too long and wide to fit into a normal wallet....LOL

 

[Worcester]

. Did it take you long to get them passed, does it always have to go to committee?

Sometimes they can do it under delegated powers, sometimes not, even if under delegated is usually rubber stamped at committee ...

They have a pretty strict guidelines to get all applications approved within 12 weeks of validation, you can appeal if it isn't, (so there can be some to-ing and fro-ing before it's validated) also they have a directive to look favourably upon renewables (PPS22 - don't get it its a massive document and will take you a year to understand it and all the dcouments and policies it cross refers to!!).

If they have all the documents, it's nearly alway done within 8 weeks - your Local Planning Authority (LPA) should have a diary of the scheduled committee dates on their website (thats why it's 8 -12 weeks, catch one / miss one)