Wind Watch is a registered educational charity, founded in 2005. |
Protesters buoyed by wind turbine KO
Credit: East Lothian Courier, www.eastlothiancourier.com 3 March 2011 ~~
Translate: FROM English | TO English
Translate: FROM English | TO English
Environmental protesters in East Lothian have hailed the decision by a neighbouring council to reject a bid for two wind turbines near the border of the county as “a robust defence of the Lammermuirs”.
Scottish Borders Council’s Local Review Body considered an appeal by Kinegar Quarry against refusal last September of its application to erect two 130-metre high wind turbines on the Scottish Borders boundary, next to the village of Cockburnspath.
However, members rejected the appeal last week on the grounds that the existing level of wind turbine development in the Eastern Lammermuirs was such that the environment was prejudiced beyond reasonable measure to permit further turbines.
In particular, members felt that any turbines of this nature and size in this general location would definitely impact to the detriment of the Area of Great Landscape Value (AGLV) which is designated between Innerwick and Cockburnspath, and also that it would be a material blow to the Oldhamstocks Conservation Area next door.
A spokesperson for Save The Lammermuirs, a representative body of a large number of East Lothian residents whose aim is to prevent the industrialisation of the Lammermuir Hills, attended the meeting.
He said: “Based on a number of recent wind turbine refusals, Scottish Borders Council is clearly now saying ‘enough is enough’ as far as over-saturation of the Lammermuir Hills is concerned, particularly for the wrong schemes in highly sensitive locations.
“We call upon East Lothian Council also to show this same degree of foresight and integrity in bringing to a halt the serious desecration of the Eastern Lammermuir fringe by wind developers.
“There are dozens of further applications in the pipeline right now at both councils; we are looking to the planners across our two adjacent counties to continue the robust defence of the Lammermuirs in the face of pressure from increasingly greedy commercial developers whose sole aim is huge profitability at the expense of those constituents who actually live here and whose livelihoods revolve around these hills.”
Protest group Sustain a Beautiful East Lothian (SABEL) – set up last year to raise awareness of the increasing number of bids for large individual wind turbines standing at more than 25m in East Lothian – also welcomed the decision.
A SABEL spokesperson said: “We are heartened that not only did councillors express concern regarding the detrimental visual impact to the neighbouring conservation village of Oldhamstocks, but also that the cumulative impact these turbines would have had, in this instance with other large existing wind farm developments in the near vicinity, was a primary consideration.”
There have been four applications to erect individual wind turbines in East Lothian submitted to the local authority in 2011, though three of those have been classed as ‘invalid’ by council planners.
The remaining ‘active’ application is to erect a 30-metre-high wind turbine, with a 100KW capacity, at Cockielaw Farm near Haddington.
SABEL is also concerned about an application for two 55-metre turbines at Fernylea Farm, Cockburnspath, submitted last September.
This article is the work of the source indicated. Any opinions expressed in it are not necessarily those of National Wind Watch.
The copyright of this article resides with the author or publisher indicated. As part of its noncommercial educational effort to present the environmental, social, scientific, and economic issues of large-scale wind power development to a global audience seeking such information, National Wind Watch endeavors to observe “fair use” as provided for in section 107 of U.S. Copyright Law and similar “fair dealing” provisions of the copyright laws of other nations. Send requests to excerpt, general inquiries, and comments via e-mail.
Wind Watch relies entirely on User Contributions |
![]() (via Stripe) |
![]() (via Paypal) |
Share: