Shipham voting closes today
Voting in the Shipham village poll closes today.... So anyone wishing to vote needs to get a move on!
However, what is not clear at present is how open the vote counting will be and in what form the results will be announced. So far the Parish Council have not responded to our request to be present during the count and we have not been invited to attend any meetings to discuss the result.
Read more
vanadium redox
Sounds like the next sci-fi blockbuster to hit the multiplexes but in fact it's a relatively new type of battery that is promising to become a key part of our renewable energy infrastructure.
Read more
Climate secretary says landscape must change
Energy and climate change secretary Chris Huhne has urged countryside conservationists to accept that landscape change is inevitable in the battle against climate change
Addressing the Campaign to Protect Rural England last week, Huhne said that trade-offs will be needed between the long-term survival of landscapes and the security and affordability of electricity supplies. "Sometimes, national need will mean we have to sit down and take a tough decision about local impacts," he said.
Read more
Shipham villagers asked vote on turbine scheme
Residents of Shipham village (near Chedder in Somerset) have been sent a voting form by their Parish Council asking whether they are in favour or against the proposal to install two mid-size wind turbines at the quarry site on Callow Hill.
Unfortunately, from our perspective, the voting paper presents a somewhat negative list of issues and does not put forward the positive case for the scheme or describe any of its benefits. There are also some slight inaccuracies that we hope to correct at the bottom of this page. Furthermore, on their dedicated web page the PC has chosen only to include documents that are biased against wind turbines.
Sadly, the PC has nothing positive to say about wind energy at all. For example, there is no mention that our two public meetings on the proposals have revealed the majority of opinion expressed was supportive, with 65% in favour.
It's also important to remember that this vote is not the definitive say in whether the scheme finally goes ahead. If you agree in principle but have some specific concerns - everyone will have the opportunity to comment further if a planning application is to be submitted. Its OK to say yes now and change your mind later!
New report down plays significance of shadow flicker
A new report from the Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC) concludes that shadow flicker has not proven to be a nuisance in the UK.Read more
How do you like your global food collapse?
If ever you needed proof that the current system is broken take a look at these recent comments from the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) reporting on the spread of the global collapse of honey bee populations....Read more
Talbot farm public meeting held
Last night saw approximately 20 local residents attend our public meeting to discuss the Talbot Farm wind turbine.
While the audience as a whole were generally in support of the scheme three particular issues were raised:
UK underinvestment wins again
A few months ago we wrote about forward thinking Aberdeenshire whose planning authority published a set of guidelines specifying the circumstances under which a wind turbine application would be granted- thus removing local politics and nimbyism from the equation.
That combined with a rich wind resource let to a somewhat inevitable "gold rush" of applications which in turn has led to the operators of local aviation RADAR systems to start objecting to all new proposals.
Community and commercial schemes alike are now being withdrawn or rejected pending the anticipated rollout of a new RADAR system to mitigate the "clutter" caused by wind turbines. This new Raytheon system is as yet still un-tested and assuming successful tests later this year, it could still be 5 years before anyone agrees to actually pay for the upgrades.
Contrast this with our recent visit to the island of Gran Canaria where we had a tour of the ACSA wind turbine factory. The airport is surrounded by hundreds of wind turbines right up to its perimeter fence and yet the commercial and military aircraft (yes there are F-18's parked next to the runway when you land) seem to fly around quite well without bumping into anything.
How does a relatively poor little Spanish colony island afford to do something that seems almost impossible here in the UK?
New minimum rewards for communities announced..
...but doesn't go anywhere near far enough!
Yesterday RenewableUK (formerly the British Wind Energy Association) announced a new protocol for wind energy developers to pay local communities an annual sum of £1,000 per megawatt of capacity installed. This means, for example, a developer who installs a 1 or 2MW turbine grossing over £500,000 annually, could expect to pay just 0.2% to the local community.Read more
Second Shipham public meeting held
A second public meeting was held recently to update the residents of Shipham village on the progress of the proposed Shipham wind turbine scheme and to further measure the level of support and backing locally.
Generally the response was still overwhelmingly in favour of the scheme with support from 65% of the residents who attended.
In response, Shipham Parish Council have decided to constitute a wind turbine working group to further investigate community opinion with their conclusions to be published by the end of March 2011.
DistGen is pleased to see local democracy in action and hopes that the level of support received to date is mirrored in the wider community. With backing from the Parish Council, Shipham village could join the elite club of UK villages that are presently benefiting from generous government subsidies the onshore community wind projects.