Moseley church wins solar panel battle
Sep 16 2010 by Neil Elkes, Birmingham Mail
A CITY parish stands to earn £3,000 a year after a government inspector ruled that solar panels can be fixed to the roof a 500-year-old church.
Planning inspector Paul Griffiths ruled that the panels would not be out of place on the slate roof of St Mary’s in Moseley. He said: “In the context of a building whose special architectural and historic interest has been largely defined by a series of changes, it seems to me that the panels would merely represent another addition to that series. Change is not necessarily harmful.”
Opponents of the plan fear the decision set a precedent for further modernisation of historic churches and buildings throughout the country.
The Church, backed by green lobby group Sustainable Moseley, or SusMo for short, argued that it would enable them to cut costly heating bills and generate income for the upkeep of the grade two listed church.
