Was there a nine-year ‘ban’ on onshore wind farms?

Energy security and Net Zero minister Ed Miliband said the government had lifted a nine-year “ban” on onshore wind in England, during interviews on BBC Breakfast, BBC Radio 4’s Today programme [1:55:59] and Sky News this morning. This was similarly reported by the Times. 

As we’ve explained before, while policies introduced in 2015 were often described as a “de-facto ban”, due to a substantial decrease in applications for onshore wind sites, there was no formal ban on onshore wind farms as such. 

We’ve contacted Mr Miliband for comment and will update this blog if we receive a response.