October 11, 2006
U.K.
U.K.
Some people hate them, some people love them.
But whatever your opinion, you have to agree they are springing up everywhere.
The latest wind farm proposal is at St John’s Hill in Stonehaven, the landscape believed to have inspired Lewis Grassic Gibbon’s Sunset Song.
Nine planning applications have been submitted to Aberdeenshire Council to build either a single or multiple wind turbines in the Formartine area.
And while Aberdeen City Council has no ongoing applications, a spokesman said: “We have had a number of pre-application inquiries from people asking for advice about mini-turbines which can be fixed on to the side of gable-end houses.”
Aberdeenshire’s first wind farm was built by alternative power firm Renewable Energy Services at a cost of £15 million near Huntly.
There are also plans for a £100 million wind farm which would see 20 turbines built offshore, stretching from Bridge of Don to Blackdog.
In July, Talisman Energy (UK) was given the go-ahead to create a wind farm with the world’s tallest turbines 15 miles off the Moray coast beside their existing Beatrice oilfield.
The turbines will be 280ft – as tall as the London Eye and with blades as long as a Boeing 747 jumbo jet.
The Liberal Democrats have said it hoped all of Scotland’s electricity would be produced from renewable sources by 2050.
Meanwhile work is to begin on constructing what will become the largest onshore wind farm in Europe in the Eaglesham Moor, south of Glasgow.
The £300m Whitelee project will see 140 turbines generate 322 megawatts of electricity – enough to power 200,000 homes.
By Kelly Wilson
kwilson@ajl.co.uk
URL to article: https://www.wind-watch.org/news/2006/10/11/wind-farm-applications-on-the-increase-in-n-east/