Village Hall Solar: A Trustee Checklist Before You Sign

A village hall solar project can be technically sound, properly funded and still be held up by an approval nobody thought to check. This checklist puts the questions in the order trustees usually need to answer them, so that the expensive decisions come after the ones that can stop a project outright.

It assumes a hall in England that is run as a charity. For sizing, costs and the grants worth applying for, see our main guide to solar panels for village halls. This page is only about the approvals.

1. Find out who holds the building

Start with the hall’s governing document, not the roof. Before you commission a design, confirm who holds the land and on what terms, because that decides whose agreement the project needs.

The charity rules on leasing, covered in step 5, apply to land held by or in trust for a charity. The Charities Act 2011 treats land as held that way only where the whole of it is held by the charity solely for its own benefit, or in trust solely for the charity. If the hall sits on land held by someone else, find out what consent that holder needs to give before you go further.

2. Decide who will own the panels

There are two broad routes, and the choice changes which approvals apply.

• The charity owns the array. The hall pays for the system, keeps the savings and takes responsibility for maintenance. There is no one else using the roof, so there is no roof lease to approve.
• A separate organisation owns the panels. A community energy society, for example, funds and owns the array and uses the hall roof. That usually needs a formal arrangement for using the roof, such as a lease — and a lease of charity land brings the rules in step 5 into play.

Neither route is automatically better. The second can unlock community investment, but it adds a legal process that the first avoids.

3. Check whether you need planning permission

A hall is a non-domestic building, so the rules for houses do not apply. In England, roof solar on a non-domestic building falls under Class J of Part 14 of the General Permitted Development Order 2015. Work through these questions:

• Is the roof pitched or flat? Panels on a pitched roof must not stand more than 0.2 metres proud of the slope. On a flat roof, the equipment must not rise more than 1 metre above the highest part of the roof.
• Does the layout keep clear of the roof edge? Panels within 1 metre of the external edge of the roof fall outside permitted development — worth checking early on a small roof, where that margin takes a real share of the usable area.
• Is the hall listed, or inside the curtilage of a listed building? If so, permitted development does not apply at all. Read our guide to solar panels on listed buildings before going further.
• Is it on a scheduled monument? Permitted development does not apply there either.
• Is the array large enough not to count as microgeneration? Roof arrays in that category need a prior approval application to the council, covering design and external appearance, before any work begins.

If every answer is clear, the project can usually proceed without a full planning application — but it must still be sited, so far as practicable, to minimise its effect on the building’s appearance and the surrounding area.

4. Confirm the grid connection route

Every array has to be notified to the electricity network operator, and the route depends on size. The G98 process covers installations of up to 16 A, or 3.68 kW, per phase. Anything above that needs a G99 application, and it has to be made before the installation — not afterwards.

Ask each installer which route their design falls under when they quote, and put the answer into your timetable. If you are applying for grants with deadlines, a G99 application is the item most likely to push the programme back.

5. If someone else will own the panels: the lease rules

This step is easy to overlook, because it is a legal requirement rather than a technical one.

Under section 117 of the Charities Act 2011, charity land in England and Wales cannot be leased without an order from the court or the Charity Commission — unless the trustees follow the statutory route. Work through it in this order.

First, check whether the other organisation is a connected person. Section 118 defines this widely. It includes the charity’s trustees, their close family, the charity’s officers and employees, and any company or other body that those people control or hold a substantial interest in. If your trustees also run the community energy society that would take the lease, stop here: the statutory route is not open to you, and you will need an order from the Charity Commission.

If the organisation is not connected, take the right advice before agreeing terms.

• For a lease of more than seven years, the trustees must obtain and consider a written report from a designated adviser — a fellow or professional associate of the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors with experience of that kind of property in that area.
• For a lease of seven years or less, they must obtain and consider advice from someone they reasonably believe has the ability and practical experience to give it.

A lease intended to last for the working life of a solar array will normally run well beyond seven years, so expect to need the designated adviser’s report.

6. Record the trustees’ decision

In both cases the law requires the trustees to decide, having considered the advice, that the terms are the best that can reasonably be obtained for the charity. Make that decision formally, record it in the minutes, and keep the adviser’s report with the charity’s records. If the arrangement is ever questioned, that record is what shows the trustees did what the Act requires.

7. Sort the export tariff last

Once the design is settled, choose where to sell the electricity the hall does not use. The Smart Export Guarantee covers solar installations of up to 5 MW in Great Britain, but there is no fixed rate: each licensed supplier sets its own tariff and terms, so compare several. Because a unit the hall uses itself is usually worth more than a unit it exports, size the system around daytime use rather than chasing export income.

Where to go next

Once you have worked through the list, our guide to solar panels for village halls covers system sizing, typical costs and the funding routes committees use. If your hall is part of a church site, see solar panels for church halls.

This checklist is general information, not legal advice. Before trustees agree a roof lease, take advice from a solicitor or contact the Charity Commission.