Compost company wants solar farm to power its plant on old foundry tip near Leyland

A green waste recycling centre at Farington Moss wants to build the 90 panel facility to go alongside a new storage building to house its compost bagging line because the site off Moss Lane does not have any mains electricity.

The scheme will mean the removal of seven cabins and shipping containers at the rural site owned by John Cooper Recycling Limited, which has contracts to handle up to 25,000 tonnes of green waste a year from Lancashire County Council and Blackburn with Darwen Council.

The three-acre site, bought by JCR in 2010, is a former tip where waste foundry sand from Leyland's Farington Works was dumped going back to the 1950s and 1960s.

The compost plant currently relies on two diesel-powered generators to produce electricity to run any welding operations, its weighbridge and its office.

If approved, the power generated by the solar panels will be supplied to a battery storage facility to power the site and move away from diesel generation. The panels will be set in three rows on a ground-based racking system.

The new building will measure 24.4-metres square. It will be used for storage and to provide undercover compost bagging, as well as housing the site's welfare facilities and a new office.

The company has carried out tests on the site to identify whether its previous use as a tip for foundry spoil has left it contaminated.