Why we oppose more wind farms in the Lammermuirs.
Further wind turbine proposals must be rejected because:
- They are now on a monstrous scale, bringing vast disruption to the landscape. This will never be reversed if allowed to go any further.
- The Cumulative Impact on the local area is massive, taken along with other existing industrial plants. Creeping yet rampant industrialisation is destroying this beautiful coastal region.
- The visual impact is already truly shocking, with massive turbines 125 metres (410 feet) high, visible from hundreds of square miles all over Scotland and Northumberland.
- The planning process via which these applications are being ushered through is scandalous. The basic tenets of the UK’s planning laws are being ignored in the Scottish Government’s quest for a higher renewables rate than anyone else.
- The developers’ supposed consultation with the public has always been derisory and patronising. They have failed to deal in any detail with the concerns we are raising here.
- If you happen to live close to a wind farm, there are very irritating noise issues to deal with.
- Turbine saturation in the Lammermuirs is causing environmental damage to watercourses and to peatlands on a large and increasing scale.
- The wind farms are already causing a detrimental impact on tourism; a VisitScotland survey has shown that 26% of tourists are less likely to return to an area with turbines.
- Turbines have a significant impact on wildlife - their blades kill birds, and their presence disrupts nesting and breeding patterns.
- There are major disturbances for local villages and roads, not just during the construction phases but on an ongoing basis with heavy plant and large increases in site traffic.
- It is unbelievably bad value-for-money for those UK taxpayers who use electricity - in other words almost every one of us, each of whom will be paying massively increased prices for our power going forward simply to line the pockets of the wind farm developers.
- It is further bad news for the UK balance of payments: all the significant components of wind turbines are imported from Europe, Asia and the USA.
Hands off our hills.
