Wind farms are a bad deal for the Scottish taxpayer in all aspects – The Herald

THE Scottish Government is being urged for national guidance on how much
wind farm developers should pay in community benefits (“Guidance call over
wind farm benefit for residents”, The Herald December 11).

The current payment of almost £7m is likely to treble by 2017 and could be
closer to £50m by 2020.

This money isn’t blowing in the wind. It comes from higher fuel bills or
higher taxes.

The base load (a constant supply to meet the overnight needs) is provided
by the Longannet coal-fired power station. The daytime increase comes from
the nuclear stations and hydro power.

Wind energy is as unpredictable as the wind. If wind turbine electricity is
fed into the grid overnight, the Longannet load has to be reduced. The
power station is then operating at less than its optimal load and becomes
inefficient. The operational costs of Longannet go up as a result. So do
your fuel bills.

Wind farms cost the Scottish taxpayer at every step of their construction
and operation.

The turbines are manufactured in Germany and Denmark, providing a useful
boost to the German and Danish economy at our expense.

When the wind turbines are up and running, the operators get a guaranteed
price for electricity fed into the National Grid. This is known as the
strike price. The strike price for onshore wind power is £100 per megawatt
hour. The market price for electricity is £50 per megawatt hour.

For every megawatt hour of wind power fed into the National Grid, the
consumer is paying double the market rate. The more wind turbines there
are, the more wind power is fed into the National Grid, the higher the cost
for the consumer. With 100% onshore wind, we would be paying double the
market cost of electricity.

Offshore wind turbines are more expensive to install and operate. The
strike price for offshore wind power is £155 per megawatt hour, more than
three times more than the market price. There are fears in the Government
that this strike price is too low to attract investment in offshore wind;
100% offshore wind would treble the price of electricity at the current
strike rice.

Wind power is not free. Have you wondered why there is a rush to build a
wind turbine on every available piece of ground in Scotland? It is a cash
bonanza, a treasure trove of public money there to be claimed for little or
no investment.

John Black,
6 Woodhollow House,
Helensburgh.