July 3, 2014
Scotland

Crunch meeting for wind farm battlers

Cumnock Chronicle | 3 Jul 2014 | www.cumnockchronicle.com

Anti-wind farm campaigners are bracing themselves for the most important battle in their long fight to keep turbines OUT of their community.

Dalmellington Community Council and Dark Sky Observatory boss Mark Gibson, along with other activists, will attend East Ayrshire Council’s special planning meeting on Friday.

And they are praying councillors will back the recommendations to REJECT Vattenfall’s 50-turbine plans for South Kyle.

If they do it will send a strong message to the Scottish Government, who will make the final decision due to the size of the development.

Community Council chair Rae Murphy said: “This is the big one and the one that we have to stop. If this goes ahead then it will lead to others too.

“It’s a massive development and we can’t let it into our area. It will have a dreadful impact.”

Councillors will visit the proposed site – just east of Dalmellington and will also be visible from the likes of Patna and New Cumnock – 24 hours before Friday’s crunch meeting.

Vattenfall want to clear 929.9 hectares of forestry land and erect 50 turbines which will be 149.5m metres in height.

The proposed wind farm will take around three years to build and will operate for 25 years thereafter.

But council officers say that it ‘presents unacceptable visual and landscape impact’ and will lead to ‘unacceptable cumulative impacts’. They also believe it will have an negative impact on tourism.

In 2008, the Scottish Ministers refused consent for an 85 turbine wind farm at Kyle Wind Farm on the grounds it would have an adverse impact on the landscape and affect aviation in the area.

If approved, it is anticipated that onshore construction could begin in 2016 and first power generation achieved in 2018.

Vattenfall didn’t want to comment ahead of Friday’s meeting.

URL to article:  https://www.wind-watch.org/news/2014/07/03/crunch-meeting-for-wind-farm-battlers/