YOUR VIEWS: Up to £1 billion of capital build of turbines on our doorstep

We are writing in response to recent letters (Jamie Williamson, Strathy 29 May 2025, and Dave Morris, 22 May 2025), regarding involvement of the Strathdearn community in communicating their views on the proposed Highland Wind Farm and the cluster of other renewable energy applications in our community council area.

Poor attendance at developer run wind farm events may well be a result of consultation fatigue and the overwhelming number of proposals in the area. But this should not be taken as disinterest or lack of involvement in considered responses to perhaps the greatest rapid changes to our part of the Highland landscape ever seen in recorded history.

There are currently some 12 windfarms within or bordering the Strathdearn area (Tomatin, Moy and Dalarossie).

New proposals may mean a further six windfarms. Equivalent to 2 GW, 10 per cent of Scotland’s onshore wind output or over £1 billion of capital build.

Statutory purposes in the Local Government (Scotland) Act 1973 and thereafter, the Local Government etc. (Scotland) Act, 1994 requires the Strathdearn Community Council (SCC) to take a very proactive approach to such major applications.

This means: “the general purpose of a community council shall be to ascertain, co-ordinate and express to the local authorities for its area, and to public authorities, the views of the community which it represents, in relation to matters for which those authorities are responsible, and to take such action in the interests of that community as appears to it to be expedient and practicable’’.

The SCC has undertaken a widescale information dissemination, mapping and consultation across the community to capture informed and considered opinion.

Our objective survey was extremely well received with responses from over 33 per cent of community residents - a proportion greater than responded to current Highland Council and CNPA Local Development Plans.

Based on the developer Environmental Impact Assessments (EIAs) the survey invited resident responses on key features which may impact on them.

The community co-exist with established wind farms and certainly recognise our green energy needs and benefits.

But not at any price. Local people feel very strongly that cumulative impact will be immense.

And it is not being effectively weighed up by the planning system. Initial turbine and battery consents are sought under Section 36 of the Electricity Act 1989.

Should they be successful, a further wave of planning applications will be made under Section 37 of the Act to enable the connecting infrastructure (pylons, cables, etc.) to be delivered.

Each windfarm development must not be considered in isolation.

Our survey alongside professional input, soundly based on community views, enabled the SCC to make insightful and material representation to the Scottish Government Energy Consents Unit (ECU) [the planning authority for wind farm development].

Our responses on Highland and other applications may be found on the SCC and ECU websites. Strathdearn Community has engaged very proactively and with much local volunteer effort into our valued democratic process to put forward their views.

Ministers hold windfarm consenting and the empowering of rural communities in their remit and we have extended an invitation to visit us.

But will communities be given a fair hearing?

Susan Falconer

Secretary

Strathdearn Community Council.

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A very fly bird!

I'm a poet on holiday at Grantown - though I have been coming to the area for nearly 80 years, and lived on the Street of Kincardine for a while.

I was having a picnic during my stay with family at Cromdale church, and noticed a young crow fleeing out of the bell tower, just before it chimed.

So I wrote this poem. I present:

The Cromdale Crow

The young bird winged it out so fast from its nest in the open tower,

tucked in tight above the rusty wheel that turns to mark each hour.

The other nestlings stayed.

A minute later came a two bell chime: they chattered,

cawed a family protest at their sibling’s sense of time.

Those chicks all know their history,

how so many years ago some stayed Jacobites, other left in time, like that Cromdale crow.

Dr Jock Stein

Haddington.

Light sentence for woman who injured two police officers in Aviemore

Re the article ‘Aberdeen mother jailed for dragging two police officers along Grampian Road in Aviemore as she fled scene in car’.

This was a very lenient sentence. It should have been at least 10 years and a ban from driving for life, however, there was not much chance of that happening.

David Orr

Inverness.

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Fight for fairness on energy bills

Amidst the ongoing chaos, let it be known that Scotland’s hydro, wind and other renewable energy sources are helping to keep this broken UK afloat.

Yet in return, energy rich Scotland pays the highest bills in the UK and among the highest in Europe.

The SNP and all independence campaigners cannot remain silent to this grossly unfair situation.

It’s time for the people of Scotland to take back control, believe, stand up and deliver independence.

Grant Frazer

Newtonmore.

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Call for turbine truths

Charles Wardrop is entitled to his opinions (Strathy, June 5) but not to dress them up as facts so to mislead readers.

He claims that wind turbines are not useful for generating electricity, because they are unreliable when windspeed changes. But they usefully and reliably generate electricity during a range of windspeeds.

When there is little wind, more electricity is generated from gas fired plants, imported from other countries, or drawn from storage such as batteries (NESO, ‘Clean Power 2030’). He claims also that they are not ‘acceptably economical’.

Yet, wind energy is less than half of the cost of generating electricity with gas in the UK (House of Lords Library, ‘Renewable Energy: Costs’).

The high electricity prices paid by UK consumers is because of gas prices, not the cost of renewables such as wind power (‘Energy UK responds to Kemi Badenoch’s speech on Net Zero’).

He claims that they would not “realistically help avert adverse climate changes by reducing greenhouse gas output”. Generating electricity with wind power emits less than 2.5 per cent of greenhouse gases than generating it with gas; this is in full life cycle from plant production to decommissioning (Ore Catapult ‘The Race to Reduce the Carbon Footprint of Wind Energy’).

Wind energy therefore contributes less than gas to the man-made global warming that is driving climate change.

A fourth objective, which he says wind turbines fail, is being landscape friendly. This is a valid opinion.

It is the crux of the dilemma between preserving our natural environment now or risking catastrophic climate change, that I credited him for raising (Strathy, May 29).

Dermot Williamson

Kincraig.

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Thanks to our Aviemore volunteers

With National Volunteer’s Week just coming to an end, we would like to sincerely thank Sue Ryder’s retail volunteers for generously donating their time, skills and knowledge.

They make a staggering contribution in helping the charity provide palliative and end-of-life care to people in their own homes and the charity’s hospices, as well as funding its free bereavement support.

Over the last year, the high street has experienced many challenges including soaring energy costs, rising rents and the cost of living squeezing customers.

Despite these challenges, we remain committed to providing a great shopping experience in Aviemore and elsewhere and generating as much money as possible from the goods the public generously donate, but we can’t do it alone.

Through 2024 and 2025, our retail volunteers gave over 1.5 million volunteer hours, equating to a contribution to the charity of almost £17 million.

They have continued to stand by us, and we want to recognise the fantastic contribution they make.

Lucy Swann

Sue Ryder retail volunteer manager.

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