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Communities in the Scottish Borders have welcomed the unanimous decision by the planning committee of Scottish Borders Council to object to Scawd Law wind farm.

Scottish Borders communities express relief as Scottish Borders Council unanimously rejects the Scawd Law development

A column today in The Scotsman by John McLellan discusses the hypocrisy at the heart of the planning system. Rural campaigners want windfarm planning decisions to take the ‘cumulative effect’ of such developments into account, but this has always been rejected by the Scottish government, despite it being a factor in other major planning decisions

As Chair of Leitholm, Eccles and Birgham Community Council, Bob Hope attended this week’s round table event at the Scottish Parliament organised by Highland Community Councils to discuss the expansion of onshore windfarms across rural Scotland with the Scottish Government. He wasn’t impressed with the Cabinet Secretary Gillian Martin’s response.

Community councillors from the Scottish Borders have reacted with dismay as their concerns were dismissed by the Cabinet Secretary for Climate Action, Gillian Martin MSP, at a roundtable event in Holyrood today.

Scotsman columnist John McLellan says the Court of Session decision this week to overturn approval of the controversial windfarm at Wull Muir, near the picturesque Borders village of Heriot, illustrates a planning system that is not fit for purpose.

Community leaders have welcomed the decision to overturn Scottish Government permission for a windfarm which would have radically changed the historic landscape of Eildon in the Scottish Borders.

The golden eagle population in the south of Scotland faces ‘very significant’ risk if the controversial Scawd Law wind farm is granted planning permission, according to wildlife charity Restoring Upland Nature (RUN), home of the South of Scotland Golden Eagle Project.

The Scottish government’s Energy Consent Unit (ECU) has approved plans for Ditcher Law, a huge wind farm development in the Lammermuirs Special Landscape Area, overriding the objection lodged by Scottish Borders Council (SBC).

Controversial Scottish government quango the Energy Consents Unit (ECU) has taken further steps to prevent local communities from raising concerns about wind farms, by cutting the length of submissions that can be made via its new portal.

Scotland’s rush toward wind power has reached a critical crossroads. Instead of delivering cheaper energy and a cleaner grid, evidence shows that much of the country’s wind output cannot be used, exported or stored – and must instead be switched off at public expense.

Local communities in the Scottish Borders have reacted furiously after it emerged that it will no longer be possible for members of the public to submit a response to a windfarm application to the Energy Consents Unit (ECU) by email.

Plans for the proposed Mid Hill wind farm in the Scottish Borders have suffered a major setback after the Ministry of Defence (MoD) lodged a formal objection warning that the project poses an “unmanageable” risk to the UK’s nuclear test monitoring capabilities and to military air operations.

200 people, including representatives of more than 30 community councils, overwhelmingly backed a unified statement calling for a pause on all new onshore renewable energy projects in the south of Scotland.

The Scottish Government has been accused of snubbing a convention of community councils from across rural Scotland which is expected to call for a halt to all onshore renewable energy projects when it meets this Saturday (January 17).

A public inquiry has opened into yet another large-scale renewable development proposed for the Scottish Borders – this time a proposed energy park near Duns.

Local communities such as Heriot are hosts to multiple wind farms and, yet have been overwhelmed by a constant stream of additional applications since 2010, according to a recent letter in The Scotsman by John Williams (Chairman of Heriot Community Council).

Communities across the Borders and Highlands are increasingly pushing back against what they see as an imposed, wind-only energy policy driven by Scottish and UK governments, as reported recently in The Scotsman.

Scottish Ministers are being urged to intervene and order a public local inquiry into a controversial Borders wind farm amid claims that failure to do so would be a “slap in the face for local democracy”

A new plan for a major wind farm and battery system in highly sensitive Scottish Borders countryside has deepened community fears about the unprecedented industrialisation of their landscape.