Renewable energy production is causing no end of controversy across the UK, but particularly in Scotland, with both the SNP in Holyrood and Labour in Westminster determined to despoil wonderful landscapes with a lattice of giant wind turbines, pylons and power lines.
No expense is spared, unless it’s to bury the cables, while operators and landowners pocket millions from the government when the wind is either too strong or non-existent, or when the grid can’t cope.
Renewable energy has become a racket at public expense, in which we pay the price ─ £15 of your electricity bill is to pay energy firms not to produce electricity, while your taxes subsidised producers by around £380 million last year.
Battery storage is said to be the answer, but the plants are ugly, soulless additions to electricity substations, like lorry parks without wheels. Now there are plans to build one in Currie near the Riccarton Garden Centre, and if an application is submitted planners will need to decide whether the Green Belt can be sacrificed to chase Net Zero.
Normally, Edinburgh throws out anything in the Green Belt bigger than a garden hut, but this a Scottish Government decision, so likely to be approved.
In fairness, the juice from all those wind turbines needs to be stored somewhere, and the nearer where people live the better, if it’s not intrusive and there is a clear community benefit.
A public consultation event was held at the garden centre last night and another will be held on the evening of Thursday, 6th March.
