Green folly

Published on 06/08/2012 00:00

Germany has rushed to abandon nuclear power generation and sought to replace that energy with renewable sources of power such as wind energy. Just as in the UK, our politicians are taking us down this same path obsessed with wind energy.

The public at large is becoming uneasy at this energy policy, as even a fool knows the wind is erratic and weak and that the massive renewable energy subsidies will hit us all and put many deprived people into fuel poverty.

Now, on the 1 August, Germany’s energy minister Peter Altmaier has announced that Germany is to build 23 new coal-burning power stations. This is because the closure of nuclear plants cannot be replaced by wind turbines, which will destroy the German economy.

So, the Germans are to burn vast quantities of coal – black and low grade brown coal – to keep the lights on in their country.
At the same time, the Scottish Government politicians want to plaster all the beautiful upland scenery of Scotland with wind turbines and pylons all for a whim of being keen to be seen to be “green”. It is they who are “green” in the naïve sense.

When the lights go out and our economy and landscape is ruined, they will rue the day they failed to exploit the vast tidal flows of the Scottish coast instead of planting the Highlands and Islands with vast arrays of giant wind turbines.

Stand up now and save your Highlands and seascape from these useless follies. We don’t have to ape the Germans by mass reverting to coal as we have vast tidal resources on our doorstep which they lack in continental Europe.

(Cllr) Ioan Richard

Mountain Road

Craigcefnparc, Swansea