Wild Land News no 60, Spring 2004

Developments in Renewable Energy since October 2003 Article

An update by Fiona Anderson and Anne Macintyre

The Chief Executive of Shell Renewables, speaking at a lecture at the Macaulay Institute, Aberdeen, said that the Scottish Executive's plan to generate 40% of Scotland's electricity from renewables by 2020 is "rather an ambitious aim", and Scotland will need to develop a mix of renewables options, ensuring they are appropriate to the needs of local communities. Provided appropriate incentives are put in place and carried ahead with vigour, Scotland's potential for RE should be realised.

Lewis Macdonald, the depute Enterprise Minister warned at the Convention of the Highlands & Islands in Stornoway that pressing developers for any more money could drive them to develop windfarms in, for example, Wales and it is for local authoriities and local enterprise companies to work with and on behalf of local communities in dealing with developers. Simon Fraser, of the north areas board of SNH said that without strategic planning guidance and having local arrangements thrashed out, it will be difficult for communities to secure more than the crumbs from the table, and the only answer is an equity stake.

Shetland Islands Council is to go into partnership with RE generating companies, sharing the risk as well as the benefits. A 150 turbine, 300MW windfarm is planned at Lang Kames by Viking Energy, to be community owned. The project will strive at all times to address any concerns the community may have. A sub-sea cable connecting Shetland to the National Grid should be in place by 2008, depending on major upgrading of the power lines between Beauly and the Central Belt.

Highland and Western Isles Councils have received the draft of a report by IPA Energy Consulting and Brodies, evaluating the viability and profitability of hydro, wind and wave power schemes. It says that developers have a "walk-away price", where they consider a scheme to be uneconomic because of the amount of community benefit demanded. The present going rate is £1,000 per MW, but communities near the proposed development at Beinn Tarsuinn in Sutherland are currently negotiating £2,500 per MW and the Council is pressing for £5,000 as a going rate. (Highland Council have prepared a draft toolkit for community councils entitled Can your community benefit from RE develcpments? which includes how a community can develop its own scheme.

The IPA report also says that a 200MW offshore windfarm showed a profit of £640m over 20 years, averaging £45m a year. For most the capital cost was repaid after four years. A 100MW onshore windfarm showed a profit of £225m over 20 years. IPA also showed that planning permission is easier for developers to get in Scotland, with a 90% approval rate compared to 50% in England.

The Western Isles Alternative and RE Partnership is proposing a Western Isles Community Wellbeing Trust to further sustainable development and distribute the benefits. All such projects be should be subject to a restoration bond. An application is due to be submitted to the Executive in June 2004 following a series of public meetings in Lewis for the largest windfarm in the UK for 300 turbines by Amec and British Energy on Barvas Moor. Local organisations favour the development for its employment advantages and the Stornoway Trust is negotiating for £5,000 for the community. RSPB is making a formal objection as the moor is full of birdlife and covered by EU designations. The turbines will be 360 ft high, three times the height of the local lighthouse, with blades 240 ft long, so access tracks are likely to be required to each one through the peat. RSPB points out that it may take 25 years before any reduction in carbon emissions is made. Alternative proposals for a 20-30 turbine scheme is also being discussed closer to settlements on common grazing land.

Concern has been expressed about the proliferation and scale of windfarms in Caithness, planning consent having been issued for three, with 8 further proposals under consideration. Caithness West Community Council has objected to a 10-turbine scheme on the coastal strip near Dounreay Power Station and to an anemometry mast near Scan Airigh. It wants Highland Council to suspend all new bids for wind masts and windfarms until a strategy is drawn up to guide future development in Caithness.

AMEC is planning a 160 turbine windfarrm at Durness, assuming a subsea cable to the Grid will be laid from Lewis to a landfall near Kylesku (before proceeding through two National Scenic Areas to Ullapool.) It is close to a large SSSI. A 24-turbine windfarm has been submitted in Strath Brora, Sutherland, in an area with regional and international designations.

SNH withdrew its objection to a 20-turbine windfarrm proposed at Beinn Tharsuinn near Ardross, Easter Ross, after Scottish Power amended the plans to reduce the likely impact on the part of the Dornoch Firth National Scenic Area. Changes were made to the access route and to the positions of four of the turbines.

SNH has also withdrawn its objection to proposals by National Wind Power for a 45-turbine windfarrm on the Glen Kyllachy Estate at Farr as described in the Autumn issue of Wild Land News. NWP reduced the number of turbines to 40 and produced a detailed otter and water vole report for the 17km length of access track which satisfied SNH. (No account was taken of the massive loss of peat identified by SWLG which could mean that it might take possibly 20 years before there is any reduction in carbon dioxide emissions.)

Orkney Island councillors have agreed to defer approval of new wind turbine applications until a planning policy is agreed for their siting. The council is to set up a special consultative group to liaise with Orkney Tourist Board about potential visual impacts. Yet Perth & Kinross Council moves for a windfarm embargo until the completion of a RE policy have been blocked on legal advice. They held a seminar in January to help decide future policy. A Councillor referred to a "Klondyke mentality" among landowners and developers, with ten sites being assessed in the eastern Ochils alone.

Glendevon Energy appealed last year against deemed refusal of three 118m high wind turbines at Balado Activity Centre near Kinross. The subsequent public local inquiry dismissed the appeal. What is significant in this case is that this application was turned down on landscape reasons with the Reporter concluding:

"The turbines would be very tall and they would appear out of scale and out of keeping with all other elements in this rural landscape. The flat landscape of the Loch Leven basin is not capable of absorbing them, and they would dominate a large area. They would also breach the skyline of the attractive hills that surround the basin. In these circumstances I agree with Perth and Kinross Council that they would have a substantial adverse impact on the landscape character of the Loch Leven basin."

It is not the principle but the scale that is at issue here so maybe there's a lesson to be learned for the future development of wind energy in Scotland.

Wind Energy Ltd has lodged 6 planning applications with Highland Council for anemometer masts in Morven, Ardnamurchan and Mull.

The Forestry Commission is involved in 24 windfarm developments in Scotland, either by leasing land to energy companies for turbines or for access to sites. The Director for Scotland said recently that given the potential public benefits from allowing wind farm developments they do not feel they should take an "in-principle" stance against them. FC has also said in response to an article in the Independent that it has no statutory duty to protect the landscape and the FC are within their rights under their Act to dispose of land as they see fit, and that in seeking to promote RE they are following government policy. In the past 20 years they have tried to follow a sensitive landscape policy in contrast to previous blanket afforestation: a decision not to plant trees on a mountain top is a decision for the FC; a decision to site a windfarm there is one for the planners.

An independent report on the Clashindarroch Windfarm for AMEC near Huntley, Aberdeenshire, commissioned by the River Deveron Fisheries Board claims that the FC is acting illegally by allowing windfarms on its land. The proposal will require the felling of almost 2 square miles of immature trees and the creation of an access road through an SSSI. Runoff plus access road construction will also silt up and destroy spawninig habitats.

However, Aberdeenshire Council has decided to support the development to the Executive because of the creation of jobs and access routes.

Renewable Energy Systems have appealed against refusal by Moray Council of a windfarm development at Drummuir on the grounds that more consideration should have been given to significant economic and employment benefits for the community.

Cairngorms National Park Authority board has agreed draft guidelines for public consultation that will not allow large-scale windfarrns, HE schemes and other major RE projects to be sited in the Park; small-scale schemes that do not have adverse environmental impacts will be accepted if all power lines are routed underground. They wish to be consulted on major windfarm projects visible from. the park area, while upgrading of the National Grid lines through Drumochter could be problematic.

Scottish & Southern Energy has identified the preferred route for the new 400,000V National Grid line between Beauly and Denny, replacing the existing 132,000V line. 75% of it will follow a similar route. The changes are through Guisachan Forest instead of Strathglass, between Strathmashie and Dalwhinnie, and between Dalnaspidal and Trinafour where it will be less visible from the A9 and the railway. The new line will have lattice steel towers 40-50 metres high, spaced approximately 300m apart. Protected wildlife sites could be affected south of Beauly and between Laggan and Dalwhinnie. The cost of putting the line underground would be 10 times more than overhead cables but SSE would have no technical objections. They are hoping to submit an application to the Executive in autumn 2004 for consent to start construction in 2005. It could be operational by late 2007. Bidwells, the property consultancy, which has been involved in 60% of planning applications for windfarrns submitted in Scotland, has urged Scottish landowners considering windfarm projects to develop any sites quickly before saturation occurs, and that sites should have proximity to the National Grid and an absence of opposition.

Fintry Community Energy Initiative was congratulated at an open day in Stirlingshire for taking control of the design and operation of windfarms in its area. Airtricity has applied to the Executive for a 22-turbine windfarm on Corlick Hill overlooking Greenock in Clyde Muirshiel Regional Park. There have been local objections as well as by SNH and Glasgow Airport, and Inverclyde Council officials have also recommended objection.

The Scottish Executive has approved Scottish Power's application for a 142MW windfarm at Blacklaw, South Lanarkshire, and Scottish & Southern Energy's plans for a 130MW windfarm at Hadyard Hill near Girvan, Ayrshire.

The MOD has said that any windfarm development within a 50 mile radius of its seismological observation post at Eskdalemuir would not be permissible. It is part of a network of stations to monitor the test ban treaty. Five applications in Dumfriesshire could be affected, plus others in Cumbria, the Borders and South Lanarkshire The Royal Society has said that continued opposition from the MOD to windfarm developments could jeopardize the government's RE targets. They reject any application within 74 kms of air defence radars. The British Wind Energy Association says that they objected to 34% of all onshore applications in 2002 and 48% in 2003 and that the Government needs to come up with a technical solution with MOD.

A British Wind Energy offshore conference also warned that the UK's budding offshore wind industry could be nipped in the bud if ministers heed conservationists' concerns. The RSPB claims that all of the sites licensed for the second round of offshore windfarms are in areas identified by English Nature as potentially internationally important for birds. This does not apply to Robin Rigg windfarm project in the Solway Firth which has been taken over by Powergen. It is expected to start in 2005.

Orkney Islands Council is supporting a hydraulic study to assess the possibility of using the Churchill Barriers which connect the mainland with South Ronaldsay for tidal generation. A proposed tidal power station costing £50m could generate 300MW of electricity. A feasibility study has also been commissioned for a full-scale tidal energy system off Luing in Argyll. A fixed link is proposed for the narrows at Cuan which separate Luing from the island of Seil.