A new video from Struan Stevenson – with much to say about Straiton. Please watch!
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A new video from Struan Stevenson – with much to say about Straiton. Please watch!
Save Straiton for Scotland 
This is a well spoken (and in my opinion) a perfectly sane and sensible view of these giant white monstrosities which are threatening more than just our country-side. We should make sure it gets as wide an audience as possible!
Struan tells it exactly as it is – this ought to be made available to every house in the land.
I agree. Most people are taken in by all the propaganda that surrounds these windfarms. Like some governments, they are only telling a bit of the story and that is the `green` bit. Majority of the population are unaware of the truth about these windfarms.Is there any way we can get Panorama to to an expose on this whole windfarm scam????
Dear Save Straiton campaigners,
I just saw this post and think that you need to be aware of what this gentleman is talking about. Before I say anything else, I want you to know that I believe that these turbines would be much better at sea where they cause infinitely less harm to pristine areas of stunning beauty, as Straiton undoubtedly is. Sadly, posting stuff like this video will not help your case. Anyone who has a scientific background (as many of the Environmental Impact Assessment guys you’re currently dealing with do) will tell you, what this gentleman is saying is that wind energy is a waste of time and effort because the grid showed a low output at a single instance in time when he looked at it. This is wholly unscientific and frankly very irritating to anyone who has to deal with data sets of months and years in order to find out what is really happening.
The man you’re listening to has an agenda and I would advise that you ensure that his views on climate change do not cause your village to form an alliance with such a man. It will not help your PR battle in the long run. Stevenson has an incomplete view of climate change, believing that storing carbon in oceanic systems is a solution to increasing Carbon emissions. This is not helpful information to put across to the public. I am not going to break down any of his arguments for you here, as there are many individuals much more capable of doing that than I am. Internationally respected climatologists such as Dr Andrew Weaver of the University of Victoria B.C. are dedicating their time to fighting unhelpful and incomplete information such as Mr Stevenson is putting out. If you are concerned about the quality of anything that you are reading from a scientific standpoint then I recommend Ben Goldacre’s work in this field. Peer reviewed studies are the only way to ensure the information you are hearing is correct.
What I am trying to say is this: If you do not put out correct unbiased information to your readership and community then you will harm your campaign.
Best wishes for the future of Straiton,
Charles Sawyer
P.S. You’re probably already aware of this, but the Guardian has an excellent section on its website devoted to debate and information about wind energy. Just make sure you check their sources. http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/windpower
There are a couple of other sites below that you might find of interest.
http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg21729000.200-wind-power-delivers-too-much-to-ignore.html
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2012/feb/28/wind-turbines-carbon-emissions
Thanks for commenting Charles, and thanks for your support. It’s worth reiterating that Save Straiton for Scotland is a broadly-based campaign. As we say on our home page, amongst our many supporters there are many different views on wind power. Our campaign is not against wind power in principle, nor does it support any particular political party. Struan Stevenson certainly has an agenda: many of them, as he is a politician. We welcome his support, and also that of Adam Ingram MSP and Chic Brodie MSP (both Scottish National Party) and are looking forward to welcoming Sandra Osborne MP (Labour) to Straiton very soon to get her views as well. What is interesting and important to our campaign is that there is cross-party support for the idea, which Struan Stevenson (among many others) has articulated, that this particular area and other iconic scenic areas in Scotland should be protected. The big need in Scotland, with a current drive for expansion of wind power driven by funding mechanisms which have encouraged rampant private speculation, is to identify which those scenic areas are and prevent the destruction of Scotland’s landscape – its biggest asset.
Our campaign, run by volunteers, welcomes comments from all perspectives, but does not take sides on big scientific questions such as global warming or energy policy. However, our local predicament has implications for scientists, politicians and policy-makers at the highest level.
Dear Mr Sawyer. I have seen the Struan Stevenson video and fail to understand why you are so critical. What he says is quite true – it was a fact that on the day he visited the NETA/National Grid data, all the metered wind turbines in the UK (onshore and offshore) with a total capacity of 7137MW was extremely low. Even today as I type, the data shows wind producing some 1700MW out of the above capacity (this is some 3.8% of total UK demand).
I am an engineer and am quite capable of accessing data and analysing it myself without recourse to the Guardian – and I can see that wind it highly variable and has not ever reached the maximum capacity rating of 7136MW – nor really come close most of the time. Whilst wind is at relatively low levels versus overall grid capacity, this can be handled by the grid but at higher levels of generation, grid instability will inevitable ensue.
Consider too that wind generation needs almost 100% backup from conventional generators – so the overall generating system is expending capital for both wind AND backup – with ensuing overall generating costs increases. To get technical wind generation is not dispatchable as conventional and nuclear generators are. That is, it cannot be reliably called on by the grid when required – as the wind may not be blowing when required. This is inevitably the case for all weather dependent means of electricity generation. No industrial economy can sensibly rely on weather dependent generation.
Regards
GM Lindsay BSc, PhD
Interesting comment in above “wind turbines need 100% back up from conventional generators, which surely is another way of saying the turbines actually do nothing!!
Sort of along the same lines, yesterday on the way to Glasgow I counted no more than 10 of the huge number of turbines on Eagleshan moor actually working which means the rest were making money for someone but not actually generating anything.
Makes you wonder if in years to come somebody may own up and say “actually its all been a con, these turbines do not actually do anything, in fact we simply turn them on and off to make people think they are working” bit like America eventually owning up to the moon landings being somewhere in the desert!
Cynical I know but I have yet to see any proof of benefits from wind farms for the areas they are situated in.