An impression of how the Muaitheabhal windfarm will look
A conservation charity has condemned the Scottish Government for ‘burying’ bad news of another windfarm during the festive season.
The John Muir Trust said the approval of an extension to the development on south Lewis will bring further destruction to one of the UK’s best wild-land areas.
The trust said it was dismayed to see the festive period used for the announcement of the east extension to the Muaitheabhal windfarm.
Helen McDade, head of policy, said: “This approval comes before a sod has been turned on the original site.
“If developers can come back after the whole planning process, including a public local inquiry, and significantly change their plans before a sod is turned with no real scrutiny, it makes a mockery of the planning process.
“There would seem to be worrying pointers about Scottish Government and planning policy that might be taken from this, alongside other planning approvals over the last months, including 59 turbines at Dorenell in Moray also festively approved, and the Beauly-Denny transmission line finally limping home with virtually no change from the scheme first lodged in 2006.”
Ms McDade said the Scottish Government’s record shows that it approves almost 100 per cent of large onshore wind developments, regardless of the level of evidence and concern on issues such as the impact on natural environment areas including wild land, damage to peatlands, and level of public objection. She pointed to the 20,000 objections to Beauly-Denny power line as an example.
“This is even the case, as with Muaitheabhal, where significant adverse effects to nationally designated sites are accepted by the government’s own advisors,” she said. “The Scottish Government Reporter for a public local inquiry, examining a version of the Muaitheabhal scheme concluded, ‘that the wind farm would have significant adverse effects on scenic qualities for which the south Lewis, Harris and North Uist national scenic area was designated.’
“There is no evidence that the redesigned scheme is an improvement as there has been no further examination in public and the visualisation commissioned by the John Muir Trust shows that this will still have a huge impact on areas within the national scenic area.
“Over thirty turbines, taller than the London Eye, will be visible for Bheinn Mhor, within the NSA.
“Developers are using the planning process as a game, where they get as much as they can in the first round, then come back and back again.
“Perhaps it is time to accept that there is little point to public local inquiries into wind developments when no amount of evidence seems to alter the inevitable decision.
The full view of how the trust says the development will look
“Tens of thousands of Scottish citizens have spent hundreds of thousands of hours and pounds bringing forward good evidence to inquiries. Sadly, the results do not suggest this is a fair and democratic process.
“It is essential that we get a national energy strategy which shows a coherent plan for industrial wind generation whilst having some regard for protecting our children’s heritage.”
The John Muir Trust is running a Wild Land Campaign in response to what it sees as threats from development, seeking a designation to protect the UK’s best wild land.
Teresa Wormald
01 January 2012In May 2011 my husband and I (both retired) visited the Western Isles for the first time. We cycled from Barra to the Butt of Lewis and were stunned by the beauty of the islands - truly wild and magnificent, each with its own scenery and habitats. We cannot believe that the Scottish Government plans to effectively destroy the wilderness that we experienced (and would very much like to return to) by the construction of the Muaitheabhal Wind Farm.
Margaret
02 January 2012I wonder if politicians really know what they are doing !
james corrigan
02 January 2012There needs to be a national public enquiry to the SNP`s attitude to the law on wind factory proposals.They are ignoring all the rules and approving land based wind factories on fragile wild land.Releasing peat bog for wind factories releases thousands tons of C02 in to the atmosphere.Some as much as a coal fired power station does in a year.Green energy, ask yourself? Millions of tones of concrete and mortar also used on the sites..Rare minerals mined up also on wild land for turbine parts.Greedy energy companies are gorging on subsidies.Greedy land owners are cashing in.The consumer pays dearly for an unreliable energy source.What the crooked triangle of SNP.Energy companies and rich greedy land owners want is access to all wild land so that they can carpet bomb Scotland in wind factories.The wind factory way will cause lights out soon.Ask Denmark and Holland?Public pressure finally caused a u-turn in these countries.The SNP are not to be trusted ever.They will leed all of us over a cliff.
tonygreaves
03 January 2012This is awful news in my view.
Tony Greaves
Mike McC
04 January 2012It makes you wonder how many of our elected elite have there grubby little hands in the energy companys pockets or eyeing lucrative posts on the boards of the companys after leaving goverment office.
They take no heed of facts that might be critical of the effectivness of the sites to produce elecricity (when you just need to look at the eyesore on the skyline as we can/do here) to see how often they are sat idle.
Historians will look back at the scottish goverment and ask why did they persue the biggest folly of the 21st Century hook line and sinker.Remove the subsidies to the energy companys and see how many are built after there withdrawl.
None.
JaneH
17 April 2013Perhaps historians will look back and thank the people who realised that to use our natural resources to meet our greed for electrical energy was a good idea, rather than squander polluting fossil fuels for electricity generation, when they are far more efficiently used in space heating.