Does Lincoln Get More Sun Than Yorkshire? The Figures
ElectriFusion Solutions · 12 October 2026
Our Lincoln page used to say the city gets more sunshine than anywhere else we cover. We went back to the sources. The answer is yes, by a modest margin, and the margin is smaller than the difference the direction of your roof makes. Here are the numbers, with where they come from.
The modelled answer: PVGIS, town by town
PVGIS is the European Commission's solar model. We ran it for the centre of each town we serve with the same settings every time: crystalline panels, 14% system losses, a south-facing roof at 35 degrees. The figure is kWh a year for every kilowatt-peak of panels.
| Town | kWh per kWp per year, south-facing |
|---|---|
| Lincoln | 1,017 |
| Gainsborough | 986 |
| Doncaster | 980 |
| Worksop | 959 |
| Barnsley | 958 |
| Wakefield | 956 |
| Halifax | 920 |
| Huddersfield | 916 |
PVGIS 5.2 PVcalc, fetched 16-17 September and 12 October 2026.
So Lincoln leads, about 4% ahead of Doncaster and 11% ahead of Huddersfield. The pattern is east to west rather than north to south: the Pennine towns sit at the bottom, the flat land east of the A1 at the top.
Direction beats geography
Now change the roof instead of the town. PVGIS models an east-facing Lincoln roof at 814 kWh per kWp and a west-facing one at 789, so an east/west pair averages about 800: a fifth less than the same panels facing south. That is five times the gap between Lincoln and Doncaster. A south-facing roof in Huddersfield (916) out-produces an east/west roof in Lincoln (800), and no amount of Lincolnshire sunshine changes that order.
What the Met Office stations record
Sunshine hours are the figure people quote, so here they are from the Met Office's 1991–2020 averages. Waddington, 6 km south of Lincoln and still reporting, averages 1,631 hours of sunshine a year with 615 mm of rain. Finningley, the Doncaster area station, averages 1,517 hours and 582 mm, though its own observations ended in 1995 and the Met Office fills the later years from nearby stations. Sheffield averages 1,485 hours and 832 mm; Huddersfield Oakes 1,384 hours and 1,041 mm.
Two things follow. Lincoln does get more sunshine hours than the Yorkshire stations, by about 7% over Doncaster. And the ‘driest county’ line does not survive the comparison with Doncaster: Waddington records more rain than Finningley, not less. Rain matters less to a panel than people think; cloud does the damage, and PVGIS already accounts for it.
The winter trough is the same shape everywhere
PVGIS models a south-facing kilowatt-peak in Lincoln at 35 kWh in December and 123 kWh in July; in Doncaster the figures are 34 and 120. A 10-panel 4.85 kWp system in Lincoln therefore makes roughly 170 kWh in a December month against 600 kWh in July. The Lincolnshire advantage is spread evenly through the year rather than rescuing the winter, which is the season a battery or a cheaper overnight tariff has to cover.
What it means for a quote
The same 10-panel 4.85 kWp package is modelled at about 4,930 kWh a year facing south in Lincoln and about 4,750 in Doncaster. Lincoln homes buy electricity on the East Midlands rate of the Ofgem cap, 25.36p per kWh from 1 October to 31 December 2026, a shade below Yorkshire's 25.60p. The output table, the city's planning rules and a worked savings example are on our solar panels Lincoln page; the Doncaster equivalent is on solar panels in Doncaster.
Questions
Does Lincoln get more sun than Doncaster?
On the figures that matter for a panel, yes, by about 4%: PVGIS models a south-facing roof at 1,017 kWh per kWp a year in Lincoln and 980 in Doncaster. The Met Office's Waddington station averages 1,631 hours of sunshine a year against Finningley's 1,517.
Which matters more, the town or the roof direction?
Direction. An east/west roof in Lincoln is modelled at about 800 kWh per kWp, a fifth below a south-facing one (1,017), while the gap between Lincoln and Doncaster is about 4%.
Is Lincolnshire the driest county in England?
Not on these two stations: Waddington averages 615 mm of rain a year against Finningley's 582 mm near Doncaster (Met Office, 1991 to 2020). Both are dry by national standards; neither is a reason to choose or avoid solar.
Where do the figures come from?
PVGIS 5.2 (European Commission Joint Research Centre) for modelled output, run with identical settings for each town, and the Met Office's 1991 to 2020 location averages for sunshine hours and rainfall.