Wind farm application
Sir – Ten years ago the East Sutherland communities were confronted with the Helmsdale wind farm applications, which were eventually turned down after a local referendum and a long, expensive public enquiry.
In 2003 they were presented with another development, this time by Scottish and Southern Energy.
The Gordonbush proposal is in every respect far, far worse than the three developments rejected by the Scottish Executive in 1998. The turbines at Gordonbush are more numerous, far higher, more damaging to wildlife and peat, and are more visible on the Strath Kildonan and Glen Loth.
The wind farm will violate the European Habitat Directive and will impact an SSSI, a Special Protected Area, and an internationally designated Ramsar site. It impinges upon the proposed East Sutherland Area of Great Landscape Value and is within the most easterly wild land search area in Scotland. The Gordonbush wind farm will eliminate 10 per cent of wild land in the Highlands. We also now know so much more about the importance of biodiversity, the role of peat in carbon capture, and the inevitable damage caused by building wind turbines on deep peat.
Why, then, has this application been approved? The short answer is that the Scottish Government and the developers were keen to avoid the scrutiny of a local public enquiry which had been requested by a vote of ten to three by the Highland Council planning committee last June.
The purpose of a planning hearing is to clarify the significant issues surrounding applications and to confirm that proper processes have been carried out. The Brora hearing for Gordonbush raised more questions than it answered – so many, in fact, that it should have been adjourned until the necessary documents were made available to the public, and the usual consultations carried out. Even though Councillors Ian Ross and Deirdre Mackay requested a deferral of the final decision (until a new access route could be established that would bypass Golspie and Brora) ten months on we still don't know the plan.
Other concerns raised included the protection of designated sites and, more importantly, the only breeding pair of golden eagles in East Sutherland and the 41 pairs of golden plover. Both species are protected from disturbance under EU legislation and represent an ongoing concern to the RSPB who have maintained their objection to the wind farm.
Members of the planning committee were not provided with a copy of the habitat management plan, the contents of which provided Scottish Natural Heritage with their justification for withdrawing their objection to Gordonbush. The implications of any habitat management plan will have far-reaching consequences for neighbouring estates and crofters who must be consulted. They were not. Equally disturbing is that the Government's own peat assessment requirements for Gordonbush have not been applied. Only a proportion of the first of six necessary stages of the required peat survey have been completed.
Struan Stevenson MEP, president of the European Parliament's Intergroup on Sustainable Development, recently called for a moratorium on building wind farms on peat until more is known of the consequences. He held a conference at the European Parliament, "Cutting Peat, Cutting Carbon?", where delegates looked at the issues surrounding wind farms built on peat.
Dr Helaina Black of the Macaulay Institute raised the important point that peat soil acts as a "sink" for carbon dioxide and actively captures atmospheric carbon. Michael O'Briain, from the European Commission, drew the delegates' attention to the recognition of potential conflicts between climate change mitigation and biodiversity policy – especially environmental risks from the inappropriate location of wind farms. "Wind energy developments should be carried out in a sustainable and balanced way that does not lead to significant damage to sensitive areas of high conservation importance," he said.
The EU has invested millions in Sutherland through the Peatlands LIFE Project where they paid for a little over 500 hectares of peatland habitat at Forsinard to be restored. What possible sense can that make when, just a few miles away, ten times more peat is going to be destroyed through the Gordonbush development? Surely, with the high cost of habitat restoration, it makes better economic and environmental sense not to build wind farms on peat soils in the first place.
Scottish Energy Minister Jim Mather turned down the Lewis wind farm project on the very same grounds that should have protected Gordonbush. He has set out the conditions for the development with which SSE must comply before they can proceed, so as not to violate British and European legislation. It now remains for the Scottish Environment Protection Agency, Scottish Natural Heritage and Highland Council to enforce the conditions necessary to protect the biodiversity of the peatlands of Gordonbush.
Victoria Reeves, Kildonan Farm, Suisgill, Helmsdale.
Published on Friday 2 May 2008 by David Mason
Last edited on Friday 2 May 2008 by David Mason