September 28, 2011
Scotland

Donald Trump continues to battle Scottish offshore windfarm plans

Press Association, www.guardian.co.uk 28 September 2011

In his second letter to Alex Salmond, the businessman said the turbines would have a negative impact on Scottish tourism

The billionaire businessman Donald Trump has written to Scotland’s first minister for a second time, objecting to plans to build an offshore windfarm near his luxury golf resort.

In the letter to Alex Salmond, the US tycoon described the wind turbines – to be located just over one mile from his golf course – as “big” and “ugly”.

A planning application for an 11-turbine windfarm off Aberdeen Bay was submitted to Marine Scotland last month.

The European Offshore Wind Deployment Centre is a £150m joint venture by utility company Vattenfall, engineering firm Technip and Aberdeen Renewable Energy Group.

The Trump Organisation filed its objection to the planning application this month.

He wrote to the first minister at the beginning of September, saying the turbines were “disastrous and environmentally irresponsible”, and left an “ugly cloud hanging over the future of the great Scottish coastline”.

Trump’s £750m development on the Menie estate on the coast is nearing completion after work began a year ago.

In the second letter to Salmond, he said the turbines would have a negative impact on Scottish tourism.

He wrote: “People do not want to travel from all over the world to go to Scotland in order to stare out at big, ugly structures. Trust me, they will go somewhere else.

“Recently a person living in Scotland wrote a letter to me saying that the erection of the enormous windmills on the North Sea ‘will have a huge negative impact on tourism in Scotland’.

“I did not include this quote in my original letter to you but felt it was an important and true observation.”

In a postscript, Trump added: “I have just learned that all 11 windmills at the Vattenfall site will look different, which will make this already ugly project look much worse that originally projected.”

A spokesman for project partners Vattenfall, Aberdeen Renewable Energy Group and Technip said: “The project partners have recently completed their formal public consultation on the pioneering European Offshore Wind Deployment Centre. We have received a lot of comment on the plans to develop a project that will place Aberdeen, the north-east and Scotland as a leader in offshore wind technology development and we will take each and every one seriously, including those from the Trump Organisation.”


URL to article:  https://www.wind-watch.org/news/2011/09/28/donald-trump-continues-to-battle-scottish-offshore-windfarm-plans/