Western Isles Council Supports Application for Onshore Wind Farm

Lewis Wind Power, a joint venture of AMEC and British Energy, has welcomed last night's vote by the Western Isles Council (Comhairle nan Eilean Siar) to recommend that the Scottish Ministers approve the development of the world's largest onshore wind farm on the Isle of Lewis, off the north west coast of Scotland. This recommendation, which is subject to conditions(1), covers 209 wind turbines and associated infrastructure.

"We warmly welcome the Council's decision to support this wind farm, which we believe will play a vital role in establishing the Western Isles as Europe's leading centre for renewable energy, not least by reinforcing the urgent need for the proposed large scale connection to the national grid to support this aspiration," says David Hodkinson, Lewis Wind Power director.

"The scale and sensitivity of the proposal has been reflected in the thoroughness of the Council's appraisal of the scheme, which included a public hearing, held over four days, of arguments put forward by interested parties for and against the development. We are pleased that, in reaching what was clearly a very difficult decision, councillors recognised the significant long term social and economic contribution the proposal would make to the Western Isles."

"We fully endorse the Council's decision to withhold approval of up to 25 turbines(2) to take into account specific social and cultural heritage issues raised during the Council's consultation with local communities and ourselves. We are confident the reduced scheme remains commercially viable and will provide a similar scale of environmental, social and economic benefits to our original proposal."

"We will continue to work with the Council and other stakeholders to progress the planning application and the potential for community ownership, with the intention of securing full consent by the middle of 2006. We will also continue to support the development of small-scale community wind farms, where we are already providing active assistance on three proposed schemes in Lewis."

1 -  The conditions include satisfying issues raised by the airport, providing appropriate community benefits and a bond to cover the cost of decommissioning at the end of the farm's 25-year life.

2 -  Lewis Wind Power submitted a planning application on 3 November 2004 to build a 234 turbine wind farm with a capacity of up to 702MW. This would have supplied enough green energy to meet the average domestic electricity needs of around 1.1 million people - over 20% of Scotland's population - and have achieved around 6% of the UK's and 40% of Scotland's renewable energy targets. The Western Isles Council has voted to withhold up to 25 turbines from the proposal.

Find out more about:
AMEC
Lewis Wind Power

Search for more AMEC News

Posted 01/07/05

Back