SSE held exhibitions at the end of April showing their plans for up to 51 turbines at 126.5m high as their extension to their Hadyard Hill wind farm near Barr. In capacity terms the extension is much bigger than the existing wind farm and the map below shows the area being proposed. The orange dots show proposed turbine location and the red dots are homes. Click on the Map to view a larger version. (Map was produced using Bing OS maps)

When it was pointed out to the project manager that the turbines were positioned virtually at the top of hills, extremely close to peoples’ homes and within the Intimate Pastoral Valley designation she replied that this was just a rough plan of the proposed development. They plonk turbines all over the area to get as much feedback as possible from statutory consultees such as SNH and SEPA. She cited an example of an application in different area which had been reduced from around 50 to 30 turbines. She also mentioned that no landscape professional had been employed in the initial stages of the Hadyard Hill Extension which begs the question why on earth put up this information? Is it an attempt to worry folk and then cynically remove some turbines which they never intended to construct and then claim “to have listened”? As a responsible developer we would expect that more care and thought would have gone into the design of a wind farm, even in the initial stages and certainly before presenting it to the public.

To see exactly how near the proposed turbines are to peoples’ homes click here.

To read the Scoping Report and download the pdf document (15mb) click here.

As it stands the development would be clearly seen from Straiton and Kirkmichael and be a very dominant feature from Crosshill.