Lightsource Withdraw Planning Application for Bowhay Solar Farm

According to the Teignbridge District Council planning web site Lightsource Renewable Energy have just withdrawn their application to construct a  54 acre, 10.7 MW solar PV farm between Dunchideock and Ide in Devon. The withdrawal notice reads as follows:

Further to our phone conversation, I write to formally withdraw our application for a solar farm at Bowhay Farm.

Please do not hesitate to contact me if you require anything further.

Sent from my Windows Phone

On reading this I phoned Teignbridge DC planning department to enquire if such a brief note does in fact constitute a formal withdrawal of a major planning application. I was assured that it is indeed sufficient. I further enquired if they could throw any light on Lightsource's decision to withdraw their application. Their reply consisted of words to the effect that:

They must have gained the impression that we're not keen on this sort of development.

I also phoned Lightsource in an endeavour to discover the reason for their apparently sudden change of mind. They have yet to return my call. Whatever Lightsource's reasons, it seems like the right decision based on our somewhat unscientific straw poll, the final results of which look like this:

The final results of the econnexus Bowhay Farm solar park poll