Last month,heavy duty digital platform scales some
of them crowded into Hogsthorpe village hall to hear Caudwell s appeal
to East Lindsey district council s planning inspectorate against the
council s refusal to grant permission.
If nine wind turbines are
granted, it won t be long until there are 30. Why should one man s gain
be several people s losses, argued neighbouring farmer Peter Smithson.jewellery scalesindustrial shipping scales
Ten
wind farms are in operation today in Lincolnshire, with 93 turbines
erected and three more on the way. Thirteen more projects are planned,
with 94 turbines.hanging scales
Voicing
the view of many of his constituents, Conservative MP for Sleaford
Stephen Phillips complained this week that Lincolnshire s flat, if
windy, landscape was unsuitable for wind farms.
People, he said,
were properly concerned that even a small number of turbines have an
overwhelming, disproportionate and oppressive visual impact .
Last
year, wind farms provided up to 9,000 gigawatt hours of electricity a
quarter of the total generated from renewables that year and enough to
power nearly 2.5 million homes.
However, each project is a
planning battle. Today, onshore wind farms that will generate up to 11
gigawatts of electricity are in construction, or have planning
permission.
Figures from the London School of Economics show
planners attitudes vary in the UK. Eight in 10 of those put forward in
Northern Ireland, for instance, get the go-ahead. Scotland deemed
friendliest by the renewable industry approves 60 per cent , while in
England, where feelings are strongest, approval rates are lower again,
at 54 per cent.
However,luggage scale the pace is accelerating. The number of planning permits issued in the year to June is up by 50 per cent on the previous year.
The
rise is partly put down to the move to leave decisions about smaller
wind farms generating less than 50 meg awatts to district councils.
Tempers,
however, are fraying. Last month, energy minister John Hayes a
Lincolnshire MP ruled out further construction. Job done, he declared.
His
stand provoked a furious row with the secretary of state for energy,
Lib Dem MP Ed Davey, leading to a situation where the two must sign off
together on projects.
Last week, Davey agreed a pact with
chancellor of the exchequer George Osborne that will see energy users
paying a near ￡8 billion (EUR 9.9 billion) subsidy for nuclear and
renewables by 2020.
Rejecting charges led by the Daily Telegraph
no fan of turbines in England s green and pleasant land that the
subsidy would add ￡178 a year to electricity bills, Davey s officials
estimated the impact at ￡68 a year in bills in 2030.
Faced with a
mounting campaign against wind farms, the Renewable Energy Association
trade body said the impact of green energy on bills had been wildly
overstated , claiming it had cost an extra ￡4 in the last two years.
The
fruits of the Davey/ Osborne deal reached the House of Commons
yesterday, though it is not yet clear if it will give the green light to
two new nuclear power stations at Hinkley Point in Somerset capacity
that is badly needed as some of the UK coal-fired stations near the end
of their lives.
EDF Energy, Hinkley Point s owner, was expected
to have taken a final decision about its plans in Somerset the first new
nuclear stations in the UK for 25 years by the end of the year, but
that timetable has slipped.
Under the legislation, investors in
nuclear power stations and renewables will be compensated if prices fall
below a strike price yet to be agreed with government. If prices rise
above that figure then generators will pay the difference back to
consumers.
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