Batsworthy Cross Pre-Inquiry

I went to the Pre-Inquiry meeting today at Bishops Nympton Village Hall. It was a beautiful day, sunny but fresh, with little wind. I took the X7 bus from Barnstaple to South Molton and walked the rest of the way, maybe three or four miles, along tiny lanes, with bridges over streams, sheep and lambs grazing in fields beside the road and the roadside banks studded with primroses and daffodils, or wood anemones when the road skirted its way around some woods (as in this photograph.)

At the meeting last June, when North Devon District Council's Planning Committee unanimously turned down Npower's wind farm proposal, Bishop's Nympton Village Hall was full to bursting with local opponents of the proposal.

Last June, the only supporters that Npower could find were a few members of the North Devon Green party, none of whom live anywhere near Batsworthy Cross. For the Public Inquiry, one of the North Devon Green Party Members, Rosemary Brian, who lives in the Croyde/Georgeham area, some 25 miles away, has set up a Rule 6 Party called "Friends of Batsworthy Cross."

This hardly seems a friendly name to choose. A true friend listens, and does not impose. Yet again today, the people of the area around Batsworthy Cross filled the hall and made it abundantly clear how much they oppose the idea of having giant industrial turbines imposed upon them.

At the meeting, Rosemary Brian asked if the Public Inquiry could be held in Barnstaple, as Bishop's Nympton was difficult to travel to by public transport. I felt like standing up to say that I had come by bus myself part of the way, and enjoyed the ride, but to be fair, there are some steep hills between South Molton and Bishop's Nympton, and it would have been hard work with boxes of documents to carry as well.

Sensibly the Inspector decided that Bishop's Nympton Village Hall was to remain the venue.

TREA, The Rural Exmoor Alliance (TREA is CPRE Devon, the Exmoor Society, the Two Moors Campaign and several local parish councils) invited Npower to put up a blimp for the site visit. Npower refused this invitation.

The Public Inquiry will last four weeks, and begin on June 12th.

Fullabrook

Near Beara Cross, Tuesday. No turbines were turning when we went up there. They turn them off at times during the noise testing, apparently. Later they were turning, slowly, in the gentle breeze.
Read more about the noise testing that is taking place at the moment:

http://www.thisisdevon.co.uk/story-15433064-detail/story.html

Village fishing industry at risk from renewables drive, MEP warns

Centuries-old village fishing communities in Fife are under direct threat from the Scottish Government’s obsession with grandiose off-shore renewables developments. That is the warning that Scottish Conservative MEP Struan Stevenson will give to a town hall meeting in St Andrews this Thursday that is set to bring together opposition to wind farm developments from throughout Scotland.

Struan Stevenson, who is Vice-President of the European Parliament’s Fisheries Committee, is the keynote speaker at the event organised by Cameron Community Council to raise awareness of the current flood of large wind energy developments currently facing Fife communities. He will explain that the destructive impact of off-shore turbine developments on marine habitats is huge and that affected species, and fishermen whose livelihoods depend on them, will become another forgotten element of the SNP's mad-dash for wind power.

He will highlight the plight of fishermen in Holderness in Yorkshire. Consent has recently been given to Danish company Dong Energy for the construction of a 35 square km wind farm at Westermost Rough, one of the most important parts of the Holderness Coast fishery. The rocky substrate, with plenty of small boulders and crevices provides a near-perfect, but highly sensitive habitat for lobsters. This habitat faces complete destruction, while Holderness fishermen will only be able to fish the area with permission from Danish company, Dong Energy.

Speaking ahead of the event, Struan Stevenson MEP commented:

“The Scottish Government’s current plan for the footprint of off-shore wind farms looks set to cover vast areas that are of huge significance to traditional inshore fishermen in fragile Fife. Fishermen in communities like Pittenweem will be taking anxious notice of the plight facing the industry in Holderness. To see the areas they and their ancestors have fished for centuries sold to foreign energy companies, and to have to ask permission from a Danish company to use the remnants, will be too much to bear for many.

“Scientific evidence suggests that the noise and vibration created by the installation and operation of off-shore turbines is devastating for marine life and seabed habitats. Driving the huge foundation piles deep into the seabed creates sound pressure levels that seriously damage the hearing systems of marine mammals and fish. Displaced sediment can also wreck vast areas of seabed for fishing.

“The SNP government simply haven't thought this through. Why are they going to ruin areas that have been fished for hundreds of years in order to build wind turbines that will last 20 at a push? Why are they going to ruin the fragile village fishing industries of the East Neuk, which add immeasurably to the local economies and cultural heritage of Fife? And all of this in pursuit of a technology that is unreliable and inefficient.”

Among other attendees at the St Andrews event are expected to be key representatives of Trump International Developments, protesting against plans for a huge off-shore array within sight of the proposed golf resort at the Menie Estate in Aberdeenshire.

Commenting, Struan Stevenson said:

“Donald Trump’s representatives are right to come along to St Andrews to compare notes on how best to face down the wind farm developers and the Scottish Government. The meeting will welcome any expression of solidarity with the growing numbers in Scotland determined to face down the threat wind farms pose to our unique communities and scenery.”

Matt Baker

We can all watch Countryfile again! Thank you so much, Matt Baker, for speaking out.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/earthnews/9094406/Matt-Baker-questions-effectiveness-of-wind-farms.html

http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2012/02/21/matt-baker-hits-out-at-wind-turbines_n_1290015.html

Perhaps next time - if ever - the producers decide to do a feature on wind farms, you can persuade them to actually visit some of the poor people in places like Cumbria, Lincolnshire, Wales, Cornwall, and now Devon as well, who are having their lives blighted by wind turbine noise.

And if they are really daring, they could do some real investigative journalism, and find some farmers too, who have regretted signing up on the dotted line, who may also be suffering from turbine noise, who may have seen their farms ruined, who may regret what they have done to their neighbours' lives, but are unable to speak out because of confidentiality clauses.

When it suits the agenda, the media are happy to interview people while hiding their identity with blurred images and altered voices. Perhaps it is time for the BBC to properly investigate the wind industry.

Here is a link to some poignant words from a farmer in the US.

This is an excerpt from his testimony - do read it in full if you can.

"I tried, as did some of the other farmers, to get out of our contracts, but we had signed a binding contract. If you are considering placing wind turbines on your property, I strongly recommend that you please reconsider. Study the issues. Think of all the harm to your land, and, in the future, to your children’s land, versus the benefits from allowing companies to lease your land for turbines."

Is Wind The Answer?

Experts to debate in St Andrews

Public information event organized by Cameron Community Council

St Andrews Town Hall, 7.15pm 1^st March 2012

Love them or loathe them, wind turbines are coming to Fife. From industrial-scale wind farms to back-garden turbines, Fife is facing a torrent of applications.

Fife Council’s Planning Department is currently looking at hundreds of proposals (1). Storms over wind rage in the local press, and are splitting Community Councils.

Now Cameron Community Council has boldly invited leading experts to St Andrews to debate the pros and cons of wind energy.

“Wind power is a relatively new phenomenon in Fife and many local communities are struggling to understand what it means for them. People are frightened and concerned by the prospect of these turbines”, Cameron Community Council Chairman Gordon Ball said.

“As the wind applications have proliferated, so have our questions. As a Community Council, it’s part of our job to make sure our communities have accurate information about the wind farms and turbines we are being asked to live with.“

Mr Ball explained that the he had invited John Mayhew, the Director of the Association for the Protection of Rural Scotland, who addressed a packed audience at Cameron Community Council last summer. Mr Mayhew explained the background to the Government’s plan to make Scotland the “Saudi Arabia of wind’”

“His talk was impressively balanced and informative,” Mr Ball added. “There was no end to the questions from the audience and many people were disappointed to have missed him.”

Mr Ball has now invited experts to St Andrews with huge experience of the impact of wind development across Scotland. “We’re encouraging anyone curious about wind to come to the Town Hall,” said Mr Ball.

There will be a question and answer forum and the meeting is free and open to all.

Joining Mr Mayhew will be Derek Birkett, the former Grid Control Engineer of Northern Scotland and author of When will the lights go out; Scottish MEP Struan Stevenson, who chairs the European Parliament’s Climate Change, Biodiversity & Sustainable Development Intergroup; Dave Bruce, who has wide ranging knowledge on all aspects of wind farm development; and Graham Lang, a local expert on the planning process for wind turbines and co-founder of EFTAG, an internet site which maps all past and present turbine proposals in East Fife.

Two of the four people who run the Coalition have family links to the wind industry

Two of the four people who run the Coalition government have family members who have made money out of the wind industry.

Read this post below from ConservativeHome
(we all know the two are, of course, but we may not have known just how powerful they are)

http://conservativehome.blogs.com/thetorydiary/2012/02/ten-things-you-need-to-know-about-the-group-of-four-that-runs-the-coalition.html

Imagine if they had similar links to the coal or oil industries!

Donald Trump writes to Sir Simon Jenkins

Read more: http://www.artistsagainstwindfarms.com/scotland/donald-trump-letter-to-simon-jenkins.html