Why don’t those who could increase wind capacity have courage of their convictions?
YOU report, correctly, that there was no new onshore wind capacity completed in Scotland in the second half of 2019 (“Wind power growth at a standstill”,
The Herald, April 6). This is part of a narrative being pushed by Scottish Renewables to create a panicked reaction in government and planning authorities that climate change targets might be missed.
There is more than eight gigawatts of wind capacity in Scotland with planning consent, roughly half-and-half onshore and offshore. This compares with just over 9GW currently operational. So even without counting any of the nearly 4GW awaiting a planning decision, the potential is there for wind generation capacity in Scotland to nearly double.
Why is it not happening? In the fake commercial world of electricity supply the companies with consent to build capacity are reluctant to do so without guarantees they will make lots of money. They do not want to compete in a market. They want electricity consumers – that’s every one of us – to guarantee their profits for decades to come
Charles will do well
AN interesting synopsis by Ian W Thomson of the Reverend
John M A Thomson’s “president v monarchy” comparison (Letters, April 7 & 10); though the Rev Thomson adds a further thought, today (Letters, April 11).
Mr Thomson resurrects the abdication spectre, but it seems Mrs Simpson had given the Establishment its excuse to ensure Edward’s departure. As the Rev Thomson indicates, Parliament is sovereign, the monarch, constitutional. Edward may not have remained anyway. and to pay for the costly undersea and overland connections needed to transmit electricity from distant sources to where it’s actually consumed.
What happened to risk-taking capitalism?
Dave Gordon, Scone.
A SUCCESSFUL outcome from the hoped-for Glasgow climate
But your correspondent’s view of the opinionated Charles and his uncharted territory? I do believe the Prince of Wales has his wits about him, and, past incumbents aside, will ensure the monarchy is in a safe pair of hands, when the time comes.
Brian Henderson, Glasgow, G42.
Scornful
DUE to a typing error (Ugh! predictive text), my letter (April 11) indicated to Scorn your car; it should have read SORN (statutory off-road notification). However, in light of your reader’s comment conference, COP26 – whenever it may take place – is predicated on at least two likely-false assumptions.
First, that it could achieve its intention to prevent or at least offset future adverse climate changes and, secondly, that there will be enough money to pay for it.
The outcomes of all the previous climate talking shops, about flat batteries, Scorn might have been appropriate.
John Carmichael, Stewarton.
Baah, humbug
I AM most grateful for the various suggestions from your correspondents for treating my grass cuttings . I was taken particularly by R Russell Smith’s proposal of a mobile fleece machine (April 10), which put me in mind of the well known Sheep May Safely Graze by
J S Bach.
I guess the accepted method of operation would be to put a stake in such as that in Paris in 2015, were marked by lack of any real progress in meeting their objectives. Only voluntary agreement was reached, and by nations responsible for only a minority of the world’s greenhouse gas output. There is no reason to anticipate any greater success from COP26.
The costs of and damage from the Covid-19 pandemic look like ruining the economies of most of the nations at present intending to participate in the proposed Glasgow conference.
World leaders must believe their priority now must be to overcome the pandemic, and any recurrences, rather than to chase the wild goose of seeking prevention of climate changes hypothetically predicted as a possibility decades hence.
The only financial benefit of the present “plague” could be to allow politicians a face-saving justification for putting the climate policies preceding and any stemming from COP26 on the back burner.
Charles Wardrop, Perth. the middle of the grass area and tether the fleece machine to it in the expectation that it will crop away in ever-decreasing circles.
This would have the considerable advantage of doing away with the need for me to mow the grass, but against that I would have to give up on the Valhalla of achieving the sought-after striped pattern effect.
After some thought, I have decided reluctantly not to take up this suggestion, realising that what goes in at one end must inevitably come out at the other, so while one problem would be solved, another would be created.
Alan Fitzpatrick, Dunlop.