Storm brews over wind farm plans (From The Northern Echo)
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Storm brews over wind farm plans
10:34am Monday 7th March 2011 in News
ANALYSIS of Government figures shows wind farms now produce 12 per cent of the North-East’s electricity – double the percentage of any other region in England.
While councils such as County Durham and Northumberland have approved numerous wind farms, authorities in the South, such as Hampshire have approved virtually none.
No local authority areas produce more power from wind than Northumberland, and only Cornwall and Cambridgeshire produce as much as County Durham.
Officials point out that wind farms create jobs and bring investment, but critics say they spoil the countryside and impact on people’s quality of life.
Sedgefield MP Phil Wilson said communities in his constituency felt “besieged” by wind farm developments after a spate of applications in recent years.
He added: “It’s the cumulative effect that I have a problem with.
“I don’t have a problem with wind farms specifically, but it is when they put too many in one place.”
The MP would like to see guidelines drawn up to prevent too many wind farms being built in a particular area.
Retired analyst Bill Short, from Northumberland, has campaigned against a wind farm in his area, however he says is not against wind energy.
He says the region has been unfairly targeted by developers who have bombarded authorities with applications.
He said: “Planners have allowed it to happen.
“Some developers have used a blitzkrieg approach.
Councils have tried to fight, but they don’t have the resources.
“When it goes to appeal the council brings one lawyer and the developer brings ten.”
According to Mr Short, the figures show new wind farm applications in the North- East are still being submitted, but not at the previous rate.
This is supported by evidence from Durham County Council.
Ged Lawson, the council’s senior landscape architect, said there had been no increase in large-scale developments recently.
However, he noted that the authority had seen more interest in smaller schemes, particularly single turbines.
Mr Short believes developers are now looking towards Yorkshire and the East Midlands for new sites.
The Department of Energy and Climate Change says that through the new Localism Bill, developers will have to demonstrate effective consultation with local people when they apply for planning permission.
The wind energy industry is also hoping to appease concerned communities by offering a minimum of £2,000 for each turbine that local residents allow to be built.
The payments have been described as “bribes” by some campaigners and are unlikely to be backdated for wind farms already erected in the region.
Comments(7)
detachedbystander
says...
4:09pm Mon 7 Mar 11
Daisykismet
says...
9:43pm Mon 7 Mar 11
Whaup
says...
2:04pm Tue 8 Mar 11
Jobs during the build are short term and the specialist contractors who build turbine arrays mostly bring in their own labour force.
Only a handful of permanent jobs are created: turbines are remotely controlled and only one or two part time jobs are devoted to overseeing the site for a medium size turbine array.
Nor does the small amount in so-called 'community funds' (the norm is only £1K per MW of installed capacity per annum) compensate for the damage done to property values and lost investment in the immediate area.
"An average turbine, of 2.3 MW receives income of about £500,000 a year, half of which (around £250,000) is subsidy in the form of the Renewables Obligation drawn from consumer bills.
"So, for a typical turbine described above, the community benefit of £2,300 a year will be paid out from an income of about £500,000, or roughly 0.5%."
See the REF website for further details:
http://www.ref.org.u
k/press-releases/222
-benefitsunconvincin
g
eco-bob
says...
6:27pm Wed 9 Mar 11
After visiting a few wind farms I can set peoples minds at rest by saying they are quiet, sit in the middle of a field and harm no one! Cows, sheep, Horse gymkhanas and crops can carry as normal.
Each application should be considered on its own merits, Brent crude today is $115 a barrel! Dispite the recession we have only 1-5 years before climate change is irreversible. UK coastal towns like Scarborough will suffer landslides, flash flooding like Cumbria will be normal every year and the south will suffer water shortages. Food prices will go up and overseas people will starve and wars will abound. Whilst there are bad applications, perhaps people should try and see the big picture.
Bill Sh
says...
3:43am Thu 10 Mar 11
The crucial time is in late evening when windflow becomes "stable". Without turbulence, the levels of wind at turbine height can be quite high while the ground levels are very low. This results in high turbine noise but very low background noise.
Low levels of turbulence can then produce a noise described like a pile-driver at a time when people are trying to get to sleep.
If we are to have any hope of seriously reducing CO2 emissions, we must have general cooperation - enforcing wind farms and causing noise disturbance would do nothing to help that. The intense controversy over onshore wind farm imposition could be the worst possible result that destroys all hope of that cooperation needed.
Scare tactics are certainly counter-productive!
Whaup
says...
8:14pm Fri 11 Mar 11
I suggest you actually read the 'studies' you are talking about - they certainly do not state that, "house prices are not affected"!
The earliest RICS survey (basically a round robin to estate agents) found a definite effect on house prices (up to 30% loss of value), as did a legal judgement in 2004:
"District Judge Michael Buckley said that the noise, visual intrusion and flickering of light through the blades of turbines reduced the value of a house by a fifth. He said that the value of a remote house in Marton, in the Lake District, fell significantly because of the construction of a wind farm of seven 40m-high turbines 500 metres away." (Times, 10 January, 2004).
Studies by Dent and Sims admitted that their study area had problems: an old MOD estate between half a mile and a mile and a half from the Bears Down array of sixteen 57m turbines, under half the size of modern turbines. The surveys noted: "No houses included in the analysis had a view of 3 or more turbines."
The authors admit that:
"Whilst no causal link was established between the presence of the wind farm and house price there was some evidence to suggest that both noise and flicker from the turbine blades could blight certain property. The results also indicated that in addition to noise and flicker, the vista (the view of countryside, sea etc from the property) enjoyed by the occupier had some intrinsic value which may be affected by the presence of a wind farm and therefore future research needs to develop a methodology which will capture the relationship between these factors and price more fully". (Dent, Peter and Sally Sims, Oxford Brookes University. 'Assessing the impacts of a wind farm on house prices in the United Kingdom', 25 September 2008. )
If you are referring to the so-called the Edinburgh Solicitors' Property Centre (ESPC) survey of Dunbar prices in relation ton Crystal Rig, that was a joke.
It was answered by a resident in Dunbar:
"House price wind up
I read your Editorial 'House price wind-up?' in April/May Power Engineer with interest.
"As a resident of Dunbar for almost 20 years, I can assure you that the Crystal Rig wind farm (deep in the Lammermuir Hills) is completely hidden from view from any part of Dunbar. Indeed most Dunbar residents are completely oblivious to its existence. To link house prices in Dunbar, which has become increasingly a commuter base for Edinburgh, to Crystal Rig is therefore a rather specious argument.
"However, what can be seen from parts of Dunbar, and is in fact much closer to the town, is British Energy's Torness Nuclear Power Station - I wonder if the real message to be taken from the dramatic expansion of Dunbar is public acceptance of a nuclear site as a neighbour?"
If house prices are not affected one wonders why the Danes bother with a statutory compensation scheme run by their Energy Ministry:
"An erector of a wind turbine has a duty to pay compensation for loss of value of real property following the erection of the wind turbine. The size of the loss of value is determined by an appraisal authority." (Danish Energy Agency website: 'Loss of value to real property due the erection of wind turbines).
A Valuation Tribunal in Lincolnshire recognised that turbines had affected property values and lowered a property's banding in recognition of: "Significant detrimental effect", "Nuisance real, not imagined" and "Potential sale price affected". (The Davis case, Deeping St Nicholas).
Your views on noise are equally subjective and inaccurate. They are even contrary to official studies by wind industry acousticians!
See the following page for numerous links on the subject:
http://www.windbyte.
co.uk/noise.html
bishop/ says...
12:53pm Mon 7 Mar 11
i dont think so