ArabiaTerra

Err, that's how you do properly weighted opinion polls. You don't just phone up x number of random people, you weight your sample according to the demographics of the population being sampled. That's why the ST poll is credible. And the fact that the same proportions were seen in the Scottish Parliament election adds weight to this. The number of objections to the ECU is meaningless as they are a self selected sample and therefore not a representative sample of Shetlands population. If actual public opinion was against the windfarm, then why did Billy get beaten by Tavish, 2:1, in the Scottish election? Complete bollox! The subsidies for renewable energy in the UK are estimated by the Government to add £8/year to the average bill by 2020. If your anual bill is £1000, that will be a 0.1% increase. What was your increase last year due to rising gas prices? Increases due to volatile fossil fuel prices dwarf the renewables subsidy by orders of magnitude.

http://freethoughtblogs.com/bluecollaratheist/2012/04/21/earth-day-2012-thoughts-like-falling-leaves/

Like I said, I e-mailed them and that's the answer I was given, Unfortunately I no longer have the e-mail. Why don't you e-mail them and ask? They've always been quite happy to answer when I've talked to them.

Sorry, but that wasn't funny. I've been getting crap like that for years from the idiot I mentioned above, I don't need it from others too.

Are you talking about Burradale here? The overall efficiency of Burradale is 52% over the ten years of operation. I got that information from one of the Burradale owners, David Thomson, I think. Unfortunately I can't find the actual e-mail (my a/c got hacked a while back and a bunch of stuff got deleted). If you want any info on Burradale, just e-mail the guys, they're usually pretty quick to respond.

The cost to the Trust will be around £72 million. The rest will be borrowed using the windfarm itself as security. See here. (pdf) Can you leave out the personal attacks, Unlinked? I get enough of that crap from Sheepshagger/Rona/bobdahog/Dratsy.

£17 million over 25 years for the Clyde windfarm. Lets say, for the sake of argument that, VE in twice as efficient so would yield £34 million over the 25 years. That's a far cry from the projected £900 million, if we actually own a share. That's what we're looking at if "sustainable" Shetland get their way alright.

I think it needs to be seen in context. Philip Green (of TopShop) dodged £200,000,000 of tax a couple of years ago by putting his income into a "foundation" in his wifes name. This was more than the total amount estimated to have paid out in all fraudulent benefit claims for that year, and that's just one billionaire. It shows where the governments priorities lie. Attack the poor in the hope of catching a few petty scroungers, and leave the rich robber barons alone. It stinks, but then so do the tory's.

Transmission charges won't be going up. The current review was instigated to look at the best way to reduce charges to encourage the building of renewables where the renewable energy is, i.e: on the periphery of the UK. As far as losses on transmission go, they are a few percent (<5%) with modern interconnectors. I think there will be enormous pressure to enlarge this windfarm, or to put it another way enormous pressure to increase the number of 3.6MW+ turbines in Shetland, from further applications from VE or proposals from other organisations... its all the same to me with a drive to maximise cable capacity (whatever that capacity might be... 600MW?, 1200MW?). Viking Energy have not been told that the 370MW (or 450MW) is their maximum. There may be pressure, but there are no plans, at least as far as VE is concerned. Besieged? Any further windmill development will be considered on it's own merits. I think you are falling for "sustainable" Shetlands habit of exaggeration and hyperbole here.

Unlinked, this article is a couple of years old, but it shows that the extra you pay for lekky to provide green subsidies is completely dwarfed by the changes caused by fluctuating fossil fuel prices: http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/georgemonbiot/2009/jul/15/george-monbiot-low-carbon-transition?INTCMP=SRCH

Additional information is available here.

Ok fair enough. I think I can see how this might be possible after a bit of further guess work with factors like output and efficiency and kwh's and roc's etc. and googling possible rates [and the back of fag packet]. I can't see how 370MW would work to deliver these promises, from my very limited perspective, but can see how bigger might do it financially (450MW with bigger turbines, and can see why there would be huge pressure for significantly bigger, providing factors affecting profitability stay consistent over the next 25 years?)... that does not placate the environmental and social issues which is why I remain opposed, particularly with the prospect of continued enlargement in the future. Do you know... is VE's income based on 50% (wholesale price + subsidies) or is it more complex than that, like liability for a portion of other costs e.g. interconnector and converter station/ transmission. The contents of the partnership agreement would helpful if you could lay your hands on a copy. Obviously, since the size of the windfarm has been reduced again, those figures will be subject to change. Though that also depends whether they can maintain the output by using bigger turbines. But, as I understand it, VE's income would indeed be 50% (wholesale price + subsidies) - running costs, of which 5% goes to the private shareholders and 45% goes to the CT. As far as the converter station and interconnector goes, they will be built by a separate company (SHETL) and VE (along with anyone else who builds renewables up here) will pay a fee to use them. This fee will be set by OFGEM. These fees are under review at the moment as they currently discriminate against generators which are far away from the power markets. (They were designed that way to prevent the power companies from relocating the existing power stations away from populated areas after privatisation). The figures which I have been quoting are based on the charging regime staying as it is, though there is a good chance that the review will reduce the charges, making the windfarm more profitable. Oh, and if you are trying to work out the figures for yourself, then remember that the windfarm returns are based on an assumed efficiency of 40%, whereas the return from Burradale has been >50% over the ten years or so it has been operational. I am not aware of any plans to enlarge the VE windfarm in the future. Do you mean other windfarms being built elsewhere, such as the one proposed for South Yell? This website.

Wow AT, you are privy then to information that the rest of us are not! So are you saying then that ahead of the tender stage that you know the total build cost and also the APR of the loans? I'm impressed! The fact that the returns quoted were profits paid out after everything else was paid for has been public knowledge right from the start. Unlinked, I think you should go back to the VE website and actually read it.

GWPF, that's Nigel Lawsons Climate change denier organisation, they're lying to you, that's what the oil industry pays them to do. Ignore it. And even if what they quote in that post is true, Scotland's policy is devolved, and there is this quote: I think the "or in planning" bit covers VE.

That would be impressive. I'm unclear about what this £900 million or £930 million as stated in this article actually means. You refer to it as "Projected income from VE". This infers profit and a huge potential income to the charitable trust. VE refer to it as "expected total income of £930 million to Shetland". This infers revenue. I suspect the latter and a struggle to eke out any sort of decent profit (after repayment of £685 million build costs and covering operations etc). [edit]Sorry this is purely uninformed guesswork[/edit], I would be glad of the facts if anyone knows the actual meaning of the projected figures. [That said, I object to Viking Energy and believe the environmental and social cost is too higher price to pay for such a large project to go ahead.] The £930 million is the money generated after the cost of building have been paid (interest on loans, maintenance costs etc).

Gas is a fossil fuel, and do you really think we could build enough new nuclear to make any difference in anything less than decades? And for anything less than the cost of the equivalent renewables? (Hint: We would have to build the industry capable of building the nukes first) Clean coal? There's no such thing. The prototypes so far built, if scaled up to the size necessary to make a difference will use 40%-60% of the power stations output, which means you need two power stations where you once had one and will have to burn twice as much coal to get the same output, which doubles the energy cost straight off the bat. (And I haven't even mentioned the extra maintenance and infrastructure cost of the carbon capture gear and of pumping the carbon across the country and out to the oilfields it would have to be stored in. Better to leave the carbon in the ground in the first place) It'll never happen because it is financial and environmental insanity. The thing is, if we burn even just the known reserves, without taking into account new developments and discoveries, we will be so far into the danger zone of catastrophic climate change that there will be no way back, so to assume that production in the North Sea will continue even for just the life of the windfarm is a mistake. Using gas as a bridge fuel over the next twenty years to replace coal while we build up our renewable portfolio (solar, wind and tidal) is something we could just about get away with. Planning on using gas after that is madness. Regardless of how much is still in the ground.

Any chance you could get said prospective councillor to give you details which you could post here? Or better still could you get the prospective councillor to come here and give us the details him/herself?

From here: Of course we'll have to see what difference the revised plans will make, but if they increase the size of the turbines to maintain the 457 MW, then the return could even be slightly higher.

^^^^ Awesome!

Yep, but we've got to start somewhere. I do have to admit, though, that I find the world's current trajectory on this profoundly depressing.

Projected income from Total: £200,000,000/30 years = 6.6 million/year Projected income from VE: £900,000,000/25 years = 36 million/year* Which would you prefer? *Of course the income figures from VE are based on an efficiency of 40%, so going by the 50%+ efficiency achieved by Burradale, they could be considerably higher.

Emissions are not reducing, they are rising, and the rate of rise is accelerating. This doesn't mean the windmills aren't working. This means that the amount of windmills and other renewables so far installed is trivial compared to what is needed. It also means that the fossil fuel industries policy of spending millions on sponsoring climate denier organisations and effectively buying the US political system has worked. Meaning that no effective regulation or reduction policies have been enacted. Kyoto was a political fudge which fell far short of what was actually necessary. It was fudged in order to get the US to sign on, then Bush repudiated it anyway. Now that Canada has withdrawn in order to wallow in the tar sands sludge, it is effectively dead. Europe was the only part of the world to keep it's promises made in Kyoto, and we only managed that by exporting our polluting industries to China, which wasn't covered by the treaty. We have failed, big time, and we're running out of time to reverse this failure. Our grandchildren will curse our memories.

There will always be new innovations almost ready for the market, and, strictly from an engineering point of view, it might make sense to wait. But there are other considerations that are relevant, namely: Climate Change. We can't wait any longer to decarbonise. We're already in the danger zone for causing severe climate change effects. The further CO2 levels climb, the worse the eventual effects will be, and the more severe the economic impact of remedial action will be. This is from page 10 of a new paper by James Hanson of NASA: From here. (PDF) I urge you to read the whole paper. We don't have time to wait for a perfect solution, we have to go with what's available now.

On the subject of the schools which apparently can't be directly funded by the CT, would it not make sense to transfer other services such as the care homes etc to the CT, thus freeing up more council money to spend on the schools?

Edit: Irrelevant post removed.