Thanks to Vicky Allan of the Herald for mentioning our Petition in her Wind of Change newsletter. She was meant to cover it on the day of the Hearing but got diverted on to Berwick Bank’s success in AR7 instead.
“Meanwhile, in terms of onshore wind, NESO has said that Scotland is already above its target. As a result, in the next round of applications to connect to the grid, “only wind projects in Scotland that have special protections (like planning permission) will be allowed to move forward. England and Wales will be open for new ‘ready’ wind projects to help fill the gap.’”
This backs what anti windfarm campaigners were telling me last year. Caithness-based Kathrin Haltiner had looked at caps for Scotland’s energy generation, according to what the grid could transmit, and found, “For the whole of Scotland for 2030 and even to 2035, what is already in the planning system, without any scoping applications, is more than enough to reach these caps.”
No wonder communities, who might otherwise be supportive of renewables, are becoming angry or cynical. Bob Hope, who chairs the Leitholm, Eccles and Birgham community council in the Borders has told Local Story Exchange that reforms from NESO had yet to have any material effect on the number of planning applications being made.
“NESO has said,” he observed, “that this is the amount of electricity we need from windfarms, and this is the amount we need from battery storage. Each region has been given quotas. “But even with NESO telling us what the need is for the UK, the Scottish Government are encouraging developers to make applications. People are impacted even by the prospect of developments happening, even if they are never going to happen.”
Hope was the organiser of a gathering of representatives from 41 community councils across the South of Scotland last weekend to discuss a pause in major applications for energy projects in the area, similar to a statement released by a group of Highland community councils last year.
Like many other campaigners he complains about a lack of sufficient strategy. “If,” he says, “these developments had been planned out strategically there wouldn’t have been a problem. If the government was saying let’s stick to this amount of battery storage in the South of Scotland, and this is why we need it, and we will have a conversation with the community to see where is best to site it – that makes sense. We could live with that, and other communities could too.’
NESO is currently developing a Strategic Spacial Energy Plan (SSEP) and the Scottish Government’s own Energy Strategy and Just Transition Plan is long overdue. But while we wait, the applications still sit on people’s desks, and communities are still be asked to consider what they feel is right and appropriate, but may well, in any case, never be built, in their backyard.
Hope’s south of Scotland meeting came in the wake of a petition to ‘Increase the ability of communities to influence planning decisions for onshore windfarms’. At its hearing in Holyrood last week, former Minister for Energy, Fergus Ewing asked, “How much wind energy is enough? How much is too much?”
These are valid questions, even in a world where moral ambition is required to tackle the climate crisis. They are especially valid when the grid operator itself is putting the brakes on connection consents. How much do we need? Where? And when? And does the system we have in place have a hope of delivering?’ https://www.heraldscotland.com/opinion/25782606.communities-asking-how-much-enough-wind-/?ref=eb&nid=2693&block=mega_article&u=c6a2fc9ddbe5aa39c48f30529b7ba3aa&date=200126&fbclid=IwY2xjawPdeC9leHRuA2FlbQIxMQBzcnRjBmFwcF9pZBAyMjIwMzkxNzg4MjAwODkyAAEeu2Bw6gnHg09HABhmy2JC-cg8v30ge638XaL58EV1sWXLR1omZWxnuIghPWE_aem_gylK3g5zip0WxXIdTkTx2g
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