An application for a single turbine has been made to South Ayrshire Council at Glenauchie in the upper Girvan valley. A single turbine might seem small beer compared with the Linfairn wind farm proposal: however the fact remains that the proposed Glenauchie turbine is 77m high – which is 253 feet, and so it far exceeds the height limits set by South Ayrshire’s own guidelines. It would be easy, but wrong, to ignore the Glenauchie application simply because it is in the shadow of the Linfairn application. It would set a precedent for developers to try bypass the planning guidelines which exist.

In the South Ayrshire Landscape Wind Energy Capacity Study of July 2013, it states on page 58 (guidance for Intimate Pastoral Valleys), that: “The assessment found no scope for the large and medium typologies (turbines >50m) to be accommodated within the Intimate Pastoral Valley (13) landscape character type.” The study recommends that there would be very limited scope for single turbines at the lower end of the 30-50m range in this landscape context – i.e. less than half the height of the turbine being proposed. (Click here to download the report in PDF form)

At SaveStraiton, we agree strongly with South Ayrshire’s own view that large industrial turbines are unsuitable in this intimate valley context. It would be very good if any objections to the Glenauchie turbine could be made AS SOON AS POSSIBLE on the South Ayrshire planning website: CLICK HERE TO MAKE YOUR COMMENT

The closing date is officially past, but comments are still being accepted.

You could also point out the turbine’s proximity to the designed landscape of Craigengillan estate, and its proximity to the Galloway Forest Park, the Galloway Forest Dark Sky Park and to the Galloway and South Ayrshire Biosphere.