FUNDING worth £350,000 will be ploughed into a plan for a solar farm near Caldicot if councillors give it the green light next week.

Monmouthshire council wants to build a 22,660 solar panel farm on land at Oak Grove Farm in Crick.

It has said it would generate enough power for about 4,000 homes and that it would save 2,395 tonnes of C02 emissions every year. It would provide four times more capacity than the council’s renewable energy technologies installed to date.

The money would be used to start work on the farm’s connection to the National Grid.

Based on the UK Government’s current Feed In Tariff (FIT) scheme the council would stand to make £2.353 million over 20 years and an average net income of £117,692 a year.

The scheme would provide 5.67 megawatts of energy which would be directed to a National Grid connection outside the site’s boundary.

It would include substations but the conditions of location and size will be dealt with if planning permission is granted.

If the plan is given planning permission, it will be screened from view with hedgerows, narrow tree belts and surrounded by 2.5 metre high deer fencing to keep the site secure as well as CCTV monitoring equipment.

The nearest resident to the proposed site lives 200 metres away and there is also a part council-owned tenanted farm with association buildings to the east of the farm.

Monmouthshire council would be only one of a select group of local authorities who run their own solar farm. Wrexham was the first local authority in Wales to own and operate a farm on council land. That was completed in May.

Telford and Wrekin completed its farm at the end of 2014. But Monmouthshire’s farm would produce more power than both of those.

Money would be taken from the scheme for Monmouthshire community projects. This would last for 20 years and total £5,000 a year. The fund will be available six months after the farm is completed.

The plan will be discussed at a meeting at County Hall in Usk on Thursday.

Since 2010 four solar farms have been approved in Monmouthshire. Three are near Usk on land at Llancayo Farm, at Lower House Farm, Kemys Commander and at Buckwell Farm, Pen Y Cae Mawr.

The most recent approved application was at Llanvapley, on the outskirts of Abergavenny.