Letters / Energy poverty is only going to get worse
The overwhelming impression from the latest SSEN “consultation” at Voe about their plans for the North of Shetland was of out of control industrialisation of our islands.
We might be allowed to make suggestions to “fine tune ” their preferred options but nothing more.
There would be no opportunity to simply say that the whole thing was unacceptable and that enough damage has been done by the Viking wind farm development and its associated works.
Outrage in Voe – community gives thumbs down to pylons and new substation
We are being expected to sit back and accept that all this is for the greater good without being consulted properly, with our council under the control of SSE, as indeed Ofgem also appears to be.
Clearly, no lessons have been learned from the Viking debacle where grid capacity issues further south mean the wind farm stands idle much of the time. You are much more likely to see the turbine blades turning when there is little wind and output low, when there is no danger of overloading the system.
What therefore is the point of driving forward with plans for an even larger converter station and subsea cable before sorting out the inadequacies of what is here already?
More broadly, is it a wise use of resources putting energy generators hundreds of miles distant from energy demand? It is becoming very clear that over the whole UK there is increasing resistance to the massive infrastructure needed to make this all work.
The headlong dash for renewables and all the infrastructure required really needs to be paused for a full review and cost benefit analysis of what is proposed. This is particularly true of offshore wind where serious issues have emerged.
The one sure thing about all this is that none of the current projects in the pipeline will be cheap to develop or, in some cases, desirable and energy poverty is only going to get worse.
Frank Hay
Chairman, Sustainable Shetland
