Windfarms‘scam’

I always look forward to reading Brian Wilson’s Scottish Perspective column in The Scotsman on Fridays.

I invariably find myself in full agreement with Brian, so as someone with a long-held interest in energy matters and an aversion to what I regard as the scam of renewable energy, imagine my disappointment on Friday, 9 June when I read his article in support of offshore wind farms (“While Scotland deliberates over one offshore wind farm, 29 go ahead south of Border”).

For one who is normally so well-informed and impeccably objective, I found his views on this subject to be unusually ill-informed, or perhaps his admitted involvement in the industry would account for some of his utterances in support of it.

As with onshore wind, there is absolutely no economic, strategic or environmental case to be made for this form of energy, and the only people who speak in its favour are either those who have a vested interest (usually financial) in it, those who have no understanding of the industry, or environmentalists who support everything which has a green label on it, no matter whether the label is merited. Until we have technologies which permit us to store energy in the sort of quantities required, then all the intermittent systems of generation provide no useful contribution to our national energy needs or our environmental aspirations.

Claims by the industry and its funded chums in the pseudo-environmental organisations of “cheap and green” are dishonest, to say the least. Spurious figures of emissions saved and houses powered are reeled off but seldom challenged.

The cost of necessary backupprovisionissimplyignored, and all this is to keep the subsidy gravy train on the rails.

It is shameful, and I am surprised that someone as honest and intelligent as Brian Wilson supports such madness. I would love to hear his justification.