Tory wind-farm ‘hypocrisy’
MSP plans new £8m site despite party’s pledge to end construction
THE Scottish Tories have been accused of gross hypocrisy after denouncing wind farms while one of their own MSPs plans a massive wind farm on his Highland estate.
Declaring “rural Scotland has had enough”, energy spokesman Murdo Fraser has urged the SNP to back a Tory election pledge to “end any new public subsidy” for onshore turbines.
“The Scottish Government has rolled out the red carpet for wind farms for too long,” he said.
“We can see the visual damage that has caused, and it makes no financial sense for so much money to be ploughed into a form of energy that is unreliable and intermittent.
“The Conservatives in Westminster have pledged to end subsidies. Communities who have had their landscapes blighted by turbines will no doubt agree.”
However, one community potentially “blighted by turbines” owes its fate directly to Mr Fraser’s Holyrood colleague, the Tory environment spokesman Sir Jamie McGrigor.
The Highlands and Islands MSP has angered many constituents by signing an £8 million deal with German energy firm RWE Innogy for a 45-megawatt wind farm at Ardchonnel, near Loch Awe.
Argyll & Bute councillors unanimously refused the scheme plan- ning permission last year “due to its adverse landscape, visual, and cumulative impact on the landscape setting”.
However RWE Innogy appealed, and a final decision is now expected this summer.
Campaigner Irene McClounnan from the nearby village of Dalavich, accused the Tories of “horrendous” double-standards on the issue.
She said: “How hypocritical can they get? They’re just trying to get back some of their votes and hoping that folk who are against wind farms will back them.”
Mr Fraser spoke out after new official figures showed there are already 15.8 gigawatts of wind farm capacity installed, approved or under construction in Scotland, enough to hit the SNP target of 100 per cent of the country’s electricity coming from renewables by 2020.
The 15 new turbines proposed for Ardchonnel would generate enough electricity to supply 40 per cent of the homes in Argyll & Bute.
Sir Jamie, 65, who says the project would mean new jobs, stands to make a fortune from it.
According to his 2011 contract with RWE, he should receive at least £315,000 a year, which over the 25-year life of the turbines should amount to more than £8m.
Three years before signing with RWE, Sir Jamie put his name to a parliamentary motion demanding rules on wind farms to end “speculative applications ... threatening scenic areas”.
A spokeswoman for the Scottish Conservatives said: “This is a personal matter for the MSP involved and does not dictate Scottish Conservative Party policy.”