Hanging Houghton Wind Farm Proposal – environmental effects to local and migratory wild birds.

Background

We have been monitoring birds in the Hanging Houghton and Brixworth areas for twenty-five years.  Mostly this is record keeping of scarcer species, plus noteworthy numbers of common species or unusual behaviour.

Up until 2004, all relevant records have been submitted for inclusion within the annual Northants Bird Report.

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Extracts from Private Eye, issue 1214.

Gordon Brown recently announced his £100bn green energy package including the building of 3000 more wind turbines across Britain. Wind companies have been contacting landowners whose property might be suitable for these lucrative monsters.

The government is now taking powers to railroad these through planning regardless of local objections. Leasing out land can seem very attractive to farmers. A recent letter sent out to farmers by Scottish Power Renewables promised “the chance to make millions”. For each 2 megawatt turbine the company will pay £10,500 for 25 years. The reward for allowing a 10 turbine wind farm on your land could work out at £2.6m. Elsewhere landowners have been offered as much as £17,000 a year for 1 turbine giving £425,000 over 25 years. What these companies are NOT telling farmers is how much they themselves can hope to make.

Although a 2 megawatt turbine up to 350 feet high generates on average only a quarter of its capacity due to variable windspeeds, thanks to the government’s subsidy system this will earn the turbine owner approximately £450,000 a year. £230,000 comes from selling electricity to the grid BUT the developer also gets a further £218,000 from the government’s “renewables obligation”. This compels electricity suppliers to buy all the power generated from wind farms and we the electricity consumers have that £218,000 fed straight into our electricity bills.

This is the secret the wind companies are anxious not to reveal to farmers. Each year the developer will make considerably more money than the landowner will in 25 years. By the time a farmer who has a 2 megawatt turbine on his land has made his £425,000 the wind company will have put £11m, yes £11m in the bank. This in return for an initial outlay of approximately £2m plus yearly maintenance costs which are tax deductible.

MINIMAL BENEFIT TO THE TAXPAYER.

Last year the 2000 turbines already built produced less electricity than a single gas fired power station and much less than a nuclear plant. Even the 7000 additional turbines Brown boasts of building (including offshore) will produce less electricity than the Drax coal fired power station in Yorkshire.

Clearly the driver for all this is cash and NOT saving the planet.

Canadian scientists believe that sudden changes in pressure are the reason for the alarmingly high number of bat fatalities around wind turbines.

This was widely reported in the media yesterday:

• AOL News: Pressure drop blamed for bat deaths
• BBC News: Wind farms put pressure on bats
• National Geographic News: Wind Turbines give bats the “bends,” study finds