It is ironic that on the day construction at last starts on the Wales Dragon Film Studios near Bridgend we are again informed of yet another plan for a further wind farm which will ruin the surrounding mountains, one of the purposes for which film makers decide to come to Wales, to take in our beautiful, wild and uncluttered scenery.
This is yet another aspect which the Welsh Assembly Government failed to take into account when producing the discredited Tan 8 document.
The latest windfarm proposal is for 15 wind turbines, 115 metres high, at Maesgwyn, between Glynneath and the Dulais Valley, in Tan 8’s “Strategic Search Area E”.
Last year, in the Swansea part of SSA E, a film company made several visits, the main reason being the wild and open nature of the landscape which in this case was doubling as a remote area of historic Scotland. Maybe they could not now find anywhere suitable in Scotland without wind turbines – or perhaps this was just more accessible.
Either way, their visits benefited the local economy, and such use by film companies tends to generate more benefits. What is certain is that if there had been wind turbines all over the surrounding hills, as envisaged in Tan 8, they would not have come.
What sense does it make to encourage visiting film makers by developing a complex at Bridgend and at the same time removing one of the main reasons for them to come to Wales?
Add to this the damage to the tourism industry, and the whole concept of ranks of wind turbines across the roof and shores of Wales, producing intermittently and unpredictably amounts of electricity far less than developers lead us to expect, seems utterly foolish, especially when there are much less damaging ways to produce electricity (in which Wales is self-sufficient, in any case).
It is about as sensible as standing in the road and waving at cars in an attempt to warn them of a hold-up ahead, inadvertently causing them to swerve resulting in a fatal accident.
Wales is under serious threat of being fatally damaged by the misguided WAG Tan 8 dogma.
JANET MOSELEY
Craig-Cefn-Parc, Swansea
20 August 2007
URL to article: https://www.wind-watch.org/news/2007/08/20/film-spoilers/