Eco comment- Windfarm plans in England

With Britain commiting to cutting greenhouse gases by 80%  last week, a national broadsheet this week has revealed government plans to be producing one thrid of the countries electricity by using windfarms by 2020 as ‘unrealistic’.

Long delivery times, escalating costs, planning delays and ten year hold-ups in connection to the national grid are threatening to derail the government’s ambitions, this could have a knock on effect, failure to meet energy and climate change targets could see the UK slapped with hefty fines from Europe.

Elsewhere in Europe a different story is found, in Germany (Berlin) a vast warehouse contains robots and teams of engineers crafting blades for the worlds largest turbines, each blade is twenty metres larger than world’s biggest plane. Blades are mounted on 140 metre towers in Belgium, their tips will reach two hundred an fifty metres above the ground.

A machine known as the Enercon is capable of producing seven megawatts, this will hopefully produce almost 20 million kilowatt hour of electricity each year!

The Carbon Trust (a government agency) last week warned of the steep price of offshore windfarm contruction could possibly undermine the whole project,  with industry costs spiralling, the government and industry need to work together to solve the problem, otherwise little offshore windfarm development will be seen by 2020.

There is also growing opposition inland, countryside protection groups recently warned that increasing resistance can be expected and that protests, planning delays and protests are inevitable, particularly in Wales, Cornwall, Scotland and Yorkshire.