Energy / Wind farm developer aims to provide update on timeline in near future
Minutes from the Tingwall, Whiteness and Weisdale Community Council said Statkraft has not yet made a final decision on whether the Mossy Hill project will go ahead
STATKRAFT hopes to provide an update on the timeline for its proposed Mossy Hill wind farm by the end of the year – as well as details on the potential for shared ownership.
However, minutes of the Tingwall, Whiteness and Weisdale Community Council says the energy firm has not made a final decision on whether the wind farm will go ahead.
This, the minutes said, is likely to be known in the spring “once they know how power will be sold”.
Meanwhile a spokesperson for Statkraft reiterated that Mossy Hill and the company’s proposed green ammonia plant nearby at Tagdale are “standalone projects, and neither is dependent on the other”.
Planning permission is already in place for the Mossy Hill wind farm on the outskirts of Lerwick, with councillors giving it the green light back in 2019.
However this consent is for 12 turbines, and Statkraft is now proposing eight turbines which would be greater in height after acquiring the development in 2023.
A revised planning application for eight 155-metre high turbines has yet to be submitted to the council.
The Tingwall, Whiteness and Weisdale and Scalloway community councils, and Scalloway Community Development Company (SCDC), have expressed an internet in shared ownership.
Minutes from a recent Tingwall, Whiteness and Weisdale meeting said it, plus SCDC, met with two representatives of Statkraft on 29 September.
The minutes said the planning application will only be submitted once there has been another round of public exhibitions.
“Statkraft expect the planning process to take at least six months so, if an application is submitted in December, they may not get a planning decision until June,” they added.
The minutes said that the company expects construction of a substation, which has planning consent, to take three years – and the wind farm two years.
They continued to say that construction on the substation is likely to start first – potentially in the second quarter of 2026 – “as soon as the board makes a decision”, with wind farm construction starting later next year.
“They will need to remove a considerable amount of rock to build the substation so the plan would be to use that to start building the wind farm tracks,” the minutes said.
Water testing has been ongoing for around ten months, and discussions with potential contractors over the substation base are underway.
However the minutes suggest that changes at boardroom level has complicated Statkraft’s ability to make a community ownership offer.
“Statkraft got a new CEO last year and one of the changes that they have made affects how projects such as Mossy Hill are funded,” the minutes said.
“Everything used to be funded from Statkraft Norway’s balance sheet but projects are now expected to do more of their own financing.
“[Principal wind project manager] John Thouless said that this is complicating their ability to make a community ownership offer, but they still hope to do so. It may be that any offer is for a shared revenue scheme rather than a joint venture.”
Meanwhile Statkraft is holding two public consultation events on its proposed Tagdale green ammonia plant this week.
There will be an event at Sound Hall in Lerwick tomorrow (Wednesday) between 10am and 4pm, and then at the Tingwall Hall from 1.30pm to 7pm the following day.
Although the company has heralded the benefits of ammonia production and the estimated 20 local jobs the plant could create, the proposal has drawn some concern over the apparent “industrialisation” of Shetland.
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