Why build wind farms local people don't want only to pay them to stop producing electricity?

From the Highlands to the west coast of Galloway, delegates from communities across rural Scotland were in no mood for compromise as they gathered in Jedburgh Town Hall last Saturday.

Similar conventions have been held in the North East and the Highlands, and it was time for the South to rise in what is becoming a national movement against the inexorable march of the windfarms.

With the enthusiastic support of both the Scottish and UK governments, planning regulations which clear the way for power projects, and urged on by middle-class urban eco-activists, it has been easy for Big Energy to win approval for schemes in the face of concerted local opposition. But the people have learnt to fight scale with scale, and rural community councils are banding together in common cause.

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A lone voice of dissent was denounced by a vocal local as a 'windfarm weasel' | Phil Wilkinson

An immediate moratorium on new energy projects

The demands of over 200 representatives from more than 30 South Scotland community councils were virtually unanimous; in common with North East and Highland community councils and their grandly titled “Unified Statement of the Convention of Community Councils”, they want an immediate moratorium on new energy projects until a clear national energy policy is in place, a full assessment of the economic impact on the local economy and tourism, and a commission to examine the cumulative effect of energy projects.

Party representatives were called to speak and, having campaigned vociferously against wind farms, it was a slam dunk for Conservative MP John Lamont, while his Holyrood colleague Rachel Hamilton MSP attacked the SNP for voting down her call for a review of wind farm impacts on food production and the natural environment.

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Poor East Lothian SNP candidate Calum Ross, the former MP, seemed to be caught on the hop and was at least wise enough to say he recognised the frustration his party was causing. I’m not sure his party bosses will be happy.

A lone voice of dissent, an elderly gent from Coldstream apparently in favour of extracting more community benefit cash from the energy firms, was denounced by one vocal local as a “windfarm weasel”. While the admirable meeting organiser and chair Bob Hope, from the Leitholm, Eccles and Birgham community council, called for decorum, the mood in the room was clear from the applause greeting references to “community bribery”.

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Community councils from across the south of Scotland held a meeting in Jedburgh Town Hall to discuss the cumulative effects of large-scale renewable energy developments | Phil Wilkinson

Community-led renewable projects

Of course it’s not that simple and in places like East Lammermuir, effective community-led but developer-funded initiatives allow energy firms to progress their projects, while local people feel they have more control over what is happening to their district.

But in the vast majority of cases, locals no longer feel they have a say − energy schemes are done to them, not with them, is the broad consensus, and as if to prove the point, the Scottish Government failed to send a representative to address the meeting, much to the gathering’s dismay.

Political demands sweep away all considerations, as evidenced by repeated Scottish ministerial decisions to ignore community council or local authority objections to approve onshore energy schemes. In the case of the Clashindarroch extension windfarm in Moray, consented by the Scottish Government’s shadowy Energy Consents Unit (ECU) last month, that even included the Ministry of Defence which objected because of the likely impact on low-flying training exercises.

And this week the Ministry of Defence once again scrambled into action to formally oppose the Mid Hill wind farm application near Hawick, not just because of restrictions on training exercises but because it could interfere with the nearby seismic monitoring station, which the MoD operates as part of the UK’s contribution to the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, and radar systems based in Spadeadam in Cumbria.

As if suspicions about the ECU weren’t already high, it was also revealed this week that its email route for the public to lodge objections had been closed without warning or consultation. Although comments can still be submitted through its online portal, or by sending an actual letter through the post, campaigners believe it is simply a way to make it more difficult to challenge applications.

A problem for SNP and Labour

While formal adoption of the Unified Statement won’t take place until another meeting in March, to give all the southern community councils the chance to consult on its terms, there is little doubt it will happen, and the political parties will be challenged to include a firm commitment to its aims in their election manifestos.

It doesn’t present a problem for the Conservatives or Reform, but for the SNP and Labour it’s a direct challenge to the clear intention to accelerate the pace of renewable energy developments on the altars of both climate change and national energy security. There is also a danger that failure to rein in aggressive energy development spills over into opposition against badly needed investment like data capacity.

Perhaps Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar, desperately trying to find ways to breathe life into his flagging election campaign, can use the issue to demonstrate his promised different direction to his London colleagues, particularly the blinkered zealotry of UK Net Zero Secretary Ed Miliband.

Maybe guarding the back door against the loss of young voters to the Greens will take priority, but with constraint payments to renewable energy firms to stop producing electricity when the grid can’t cope costing UK households £1.7 billion bill last year − 70 per cent going to Scottish wind energy operators − there is a strong cost-of-living argument which could chime with more voters.

Of course the cynicism and brutal electoral arithmetic of modern politics could mean both governments can continue to shun the legitimate concerns of rural communities, but there has to be a better way to safeguard power needs while respecting the natural environment and historic landscapes. And if there is one fossil fuel use the Borderers want to end, it’s gaslighting.