Plans to build a new solar-powered car park in Wolverhampton have been given planning consent by the city council.
The approved plans include a photovoltaic canopy system across the parking bays, with up to 1,400 solar panels mounted on carports. The application also lists 82 electric vehicle charging points and around 1,200 plants as part of landscaping and biodiversity measures.
The location is already used informally for parking by worshippers at the nearby Jamia Masjid Aqsa Mosque, and by Wolverhampton Wanderers supporters on matchdays, but the new proposal is intended to bring the site up to a more formal standard, with marked bays and associated infrastructure.
Crucially, the plans also propose on-site management of the electricity generated by the solar canopies – either by using it locally or storing it in batteries. The application states that some of that storage would be set aside for local benefit:
Will it actually be built?
While the planning decision gives the scheme a route to proceed, the question is whether the developer behind the latest application is now in a position to deliver it.
The plans were originally submitted in July last year by Tomato Energy, but the supplier collapsed later in the year and entered administration. Ofgem appointed British Gas to take on Tomato Energy’s customers through the Supplier of Last Resort process, following the company’s market exit.
As British Gas had no intention on developing the site in Wolverhampton, the planning applicant was then changed in November to Nadeem Ahmad, listed in the application as being from Senapt Limited.
However, according to Companies House, Senapt Limited is now ‘in administration’, with an administrator appointment recorded in early February. That doesn’t bode well for the project.
Of course, the developer entering administration does not automatically mean the car park will not be built – planning permission is still attached to the land and the approved scheme, and projects can be sold on or delivered by different backers. But it does mean the development may need a new route to funding, delivery and long-term operation before any shovels go in the ground.
