Windfarm Story As originally printed in the Forestry And Timber Association’s ‘Forestry and Timber News’ magazine. "There was a man in my office yesterday. He's thinking of putting a windfarm up your way". My opinion of windfarms was coloured by my first encounter 20 years ago when I was working in California. One weekend, I drove north up the Pacific coast from my base in Los Angeles to San Francisco and passed the graveyard, strung out over many miles, of hundreds of 'dead' and rusting wind turbines, the abandoned victims of a failed local experiment in energy generation. Fast forward to 1995, by which time I had bought 100ha of hill land in south Lanarkshire, planted it with a commercial forestry crop (mainly Sitka spruce) and built a croft house which I was occupying. That year, my neighbour, the Duke of Buccleuch's trustees applied to put a windfarm on a hill on my horizon. I wrote a poem of protest which was published in the newsletter of the anti-windfarm lobby group headed in those days by Sir Bernard Ingham . As part of my transformation into a timber grower, I had joined the FTA, and through attendance at conferences and reading the journal, become acquainted with the cyclically and no doubt temporarily depressed condition of the timber industry . In an effort to do my bit, in 2002 I took a stand to promote the multifarious qualities of Scottish Sitka spruce at the Royal Highland Show, and employed one of my nieces as my assistant. Her presence allowed me the occasional stroll round the other exhibitors' stands. On one of my short excursions, I saw a windfarm developer's tent and entered in a spirit of mild curiosity. I was asked to pinpoint my property on a map, and told that one of my neighbours, a farmer, had been in 10 minutes earlier! An appointment was made for a representative to call and inspect the site. This visit duly took place and some days later I got a letter telling me regretfully that my property was not suitable because of an inevitable conflict of interest with the RAF (and other NATO airforces) who carry out low level flying exercises and other military flying practice locally. I had therefore put windfarming out of my mind when some months later at a meeting of FTA south Scotland committee I was told about the interest of another windfarm developer, Airtricity. It is this firm, whose parent company is in Eire, who have now made an application which includes a fair proportion of my land and, in its original form, would involve the felling of nearly 70 per cent of my trees. I understand that a total of 100 square km of timber will be felled for this and an adjacent (contiguous) windfarm alone. There is opposition to the windfarm, locally to which I am sympathetic. However, in the circumstances, and after much soul-searching, I am persuaded that it is better for me to be in a clear contractual relationship with the developers than to fold my arms and turn my back. If there is an unshakeable political will to establish a certain proportion of Scotland's energy needs via renewables by 2010, this windfarm surely will come. We are within yards rather than miles of the National Grid, which passes through this narrow valley alongside the main West coast railway and the A74(M). If it does - when it does - my land is involved willy-nilly by virtue of its geographical situation, whatever my personal opinion of the efficacy of wind-generated energy or the aesthetics of turbines in the landscape. A propos aesthetics, I am bound to report that I experienced a surprising change of heart in March 2005 when I visited the 12 new turbines at Ardrossan. I found them unexpectedly beautiful in their whiteness, their elegant columnar shape, and their slow-turning, silent sails against the blue sky and green grass, with the sea beyond. Such a group could be found outside a modern art gallery and plausibly called 'an installation'. Those who are most passionately opposed to this particular development locally are hoping to kick it into the long grass via a public inquiry, during which time an orderly national or even local south Lanarkshire plan for the location of windfarms may be agreed - and, presumably, the objectors hope such a plan will locate them elsewhere - rather than the present apparent lottery. The press is generous in the space it gives practically every day to the debate. No one can complain that the issue has been hushed up. Everyone is getting a fair crack of the publicity whip. Next Sunday (at the time of writing), April 10th, the eminent environmental campaigner, Dr David Bellamy, is leading a walk of protestors to publicise the beauty and peace of these hills. If planning permission is granted, Airtricity will be paying £500,000 a year through a Trust for the 25 years of the life of the scheme to the local community, currently defined as those living within 10km radius of the turbines. The three villages nearest to the windfarm (Abington, Crawford and Elvanfoot) are guaranteed a minimum 30 per cent of this money for leisure, recreational, environmental or conservation purposes. Nevertheless, local feelings run high and there is an undeniable sense that a community spirit of solidarity has been injured by perceived differences of interest. In a final stroke of irony, I was told the other day that the Duke of Buccleuch whose Trustees caused me ten years ago first to burst into print on the matter, had decided against any windfarm development on his great estates. A statement from the Estate is reproduced below. (For further developments in this story, see future issues WIND FARM - by Elizabeth Roberts |
