The Spremberg town council meeting this week gave its decision for the development plan of solar park “Hühnerwasser / Wolkenberg”. With a planned total peak output of up to 300 MW, this is another large-scale PV project that EP New Energies (EPNE) is developing and implementing in Lusatia on behalf of and in cooperation with LEAG. The project plan provides for areas totaling 350 hectares in the recultivated area of the Welzow-Süd open pit mine on the road link between Spremberg and Papproth. Following the example of the solar power plant in Dissen and in Boxberg, EPNE also wants to implement its green solar park concept in this project.
LEAG CEO Thorsten Kramer was pleased about the first hurdle that the solar park project ‘Hühnerwasser / Wolkenberg’ has cleared with the decision of the Spremberg town councils: “Thanks to the good preparation of our project developer together with the specialist departments of LEAG, we can take a further step here in the expansion of our green power portfolio, which is the basis for the successful transformation process of LEAG into a modern and broadly positioned energy, infrastructure and service company. We want to completely replace LEAG’s current 7 gigawatts of conventional power generation capacity with renewable power generation capacity and even expand the scope of our output. Our current project pipeline, which we developed in cooperation with EPNE, already includes projects totaling two gigawatts that are already in the planning stage and in some cases in the approval process. We are deliberately locating our future solar and wind gigawatt factories in the vicinity of the major Lusatian centers because we want to actively support the structural development of this region with green electricity, which will increasingly be an economic factor. At the same time, green power is also the basis for the successful settlement of projects for the mobile and energetic use of hydrogen.”
The decision to set up the site marks the beginning of the urban land use planning, which includes detailed project planning with environmental assessment. The goal is to designate the areas for the use of solar energy. The greening concept for the solar park provides for ecological land enhancement for the benefit of regional biodiversity – combined with measures for the preservation as well as further development of existing biotopes and structures. Generous open areas for open and semi-open land species as well as flower strips along the paths are intended to enhance the area and at the same time provide a scenic attraction. In addition, a wildlife corridor at least 60 meters wide will be created for large mammals, while preserving existing shrub and woody structures. In this way, the Hühnerwasser / Wolkenberg solar park links climate-neutral electricity generation with an improvement in biodiversity.
“With the Hühnerwasser / Wolkenberg PV park, we are also working closely with the community and implementing the hitherto unique concept of the “Green Solar Park”. In this way, we promote ecological diversity and fit the plant into the landscape through landscape architectural measures,” explains EPNE Managing Director Dominique Guillou. “Together with the up to 300 MWp PV park, we now have well over 1 GW of wind and PV projects in ongoing approval and construction management processes for our cooperation partner LEAG alone. These projects form the basis for the transformation of the Lusatian opencast mines into CO2-neutral energy and economic regions.”
Your contact for more information:
Margarita Schulz, EPNE, HR & Communications Manager
Phone 030 767584572, margarita.schulz@epne.de
Thoralf Schirmer, LEAG, press secretary at Cottbus,
Phone 0355 2887 3067, thoralf.schirmer@leag.de