South Brent Community Energy Society are holding a number of open evenings over the next two weeks where they will be seeking additional funding for the construction of a "medium size" wind turbine near the Marley Thatch Farm solar park. Note that unlike the community wind turbines proposed by TRESOC for just up the road near Totnes, the South Brent project has already received planning permission from South Hams District Council. What's more SBCES have already raised over half the anticipated construction costs of £420,000. The purpose of the forthcoming meetings is to try and raise the rest of the required capital from small investors in the local community. They hope thereby to avoid having to follow in the footsteps of the much larger Westmill Community Wind Farm, that needed a top-up loan from Co-operative Bank.

I shall be attending the first such meeting, albeit at rather short notice! It's going to be held in South Brent village hall starting at 7:30 PM tomorrow, Tuesday March 5th. The other meetings will be held in Ivybridge on Friday 8th, Bovey Tracey on Tuesday 12th, and Buckfastleigh on Wednesday 13th. If you do attend one of these meetings and decide that you would like to invest, the deadline for applications is March 22nd. Watch this space for our report on how things go tomorrow in South Brent village hall.

I'm currently engaged in a debate on Twitter with @Cornishview.  His avatar doesn't reveal a gender, so I'm guessing here, but it does suggest that he understands the part that coal and the latent heat of vaporisation of water played in the beginning of the industrial revolution down here in not so sunny South West England. Cornishview says over on Twitter that:

I prefer to look at facts not idealism. Fact – No link between CO2 & Climate change. Fact – Renewable energy causing Fuel Poverty.

Personally I strongly disagree with the first of those so called "facts". Here's a bit more evidence for my side of the argument. Regular readers may recall that at the end of last November the temperature in the North East of Greenland was twenty degrees Celsius above "average". As I pointed out to a somewhat sceptical commenter on that story, if that doesn't count as at least "local warming" what on Earth does?

This morning, over on the Pacific side of the Arctic for a change, comes further evidence. This is what the situation looks like from space, courtesy of an Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer (or AVHRR for short):

The ice in the Beaufort Sea coming apart at the seams, at 5:09 GMT on February 27th 2013

As you can plainly see, if you have eyes to so do, whatever little that's left in the way of sea ice covering the Beaufort Sea north of Alaska and Canada is currently cracking at the seams. According to an expert in such matters on the Arctic Sea Ice Blog:

The mid-February breakup we're observing in the Bering and Beaufort appears to be very unusual, possibly unprecedented in recent millenia, for this time of year. In the spring of 2012, something rather similar happened but in April.

"A-Team" also kindly provided a "video" of what happened in April 2012 in the same vicinity. Here it is:

The Beaufort Sea coming apart at the seams in April 2012

According to A-Team once again:

If taken as a simplistic predictor of the 2013 melt season, we are 51 days ahead of last season.

I'm off to Twitter now, to tell @Cornishview the good news.

I was idly reading this week's edition of The Economist magazine over breakfast this morning. As a one time table tennis player with a penhold grip myself, I'd just finished reading their obituary of Zhang Zedong when I noticed an advertisement on the facing page. It seems that on March 12th The Economist will be hosting "The Arctic Summit" at the Hotel Bristol in Oslo, Norway. According to The Economist the summit will present "A new vista for trade, energy and the environment" to:

More than 150 policymakers, senior business leaders and influential commentators

who will be discussing:

What will the Arctic resemble in 2050?

More on What Will The Arctic Resemble in 2050?

Prompted by a conversation over on Neven's Arctic Sea Ice blog I happened to glance at the Department of Energy and Climate Change's shiny new web site this morning, and discovered evidence strongly suggesting that Ed Davey is suffering from selective schizophrenia.

Last Monday Ed's script provided him with the opportunity to impersonate the good Doctor Henry Jekyll as he gave a speech at the Royal Society's AVOID symposium on climate change.  Addressing his audience of scientists he said some things I agree with, such as:

It is fair to say that trust in politicians is not something the public has in abundance.  That is why, when it comes to climate change, it is so important that all the rigours of the scientific method are applied.

going on to point out that:

If we have this trust in scientific evidence, why would we make an exception when it comes to the science of climate change?  When it comes to assessing the health of our planet’s eco-system – we should listen to the scientists – and we should believe them.

Two hundred years of good science – teasing out uncertainties, considering risk – has laid the foundation of what we now understand.  It screams out from decade upon decade of research. The basic physics of climate change is irrefutable. Greenhouse gases warm the atmosphere and cause changes to the climate. Human activity is significantly contributing to the warming of our planet.

Ed concluded his speech by saying that:

Those who deny climate change and demand a halt to emissions reduction and mitigation work, want us to take a huge gamble with the future of every human being on the planet, every future human being, our children and grand children, and every other living species.

We will not take that risk.

All of that is great to hear of course, but when it comes to the practicalities of  "emissions reduction and mitigation work" it seems as though a demonic Mr. Edward Hyde takes charge of writing Ed's press releases. On Wednesday Statoil announced that:

The UK government's Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC) today announced their approval of the field development plan put forward by Statoil and its co-venturers for the Mariner heavy oil field. Statoil expects to start production from Mariner in 2017, and the field is expected to produce for 30 years. The average production is estimated at around 55,000 barrels of oil per day over the plateau period from 2017 to 2020.

DECC proudly pointed out that:

The development of the £4.6 billion Mariner heavy oil field has been made possible through partnership between government and industry, together with targeted tax breaks.

and Ed had this to say about the matter:

North Sea oil and gas is a vital asset. It provides energy security for the UK, reduces our reliance on volatile international energy markets and supports hundreds of thousands of jobs across the country. Mariner will be one of the biggest projects ever in the North Sea and the £4.6billion commitment over 40 years from Statoil is a vote of confidence in the future of UK oil and gas. Importantly, unlocking heavy oil production marks a new chapter in development, opening the potential for five per cent of our oil reserves.

Note that on this occasion for some strange reason Ed made no mention of what Monday's audience might have to say about the impact of  "unlocking heavy oil production" on "our children and grand children, and every other living species".

The first thing that springs to my mind is that Ed should make his mind(s) up.

On Wednesday afternoon South Hams District Council development management committee debated whether to give permission for the construction of the Totnes Community Wind Farm. They ultimately decided to follow the recommendation in their planning officer's report on the proposal, and refused such permission.  According to the council's decision notice:

The proposal would introduce two tall moving structures into a landscape void of such development and would result in significant harm to the landscape character of the surrounding area. The Local Planning Authority is not satisfied that the environmental and economic benefits of the turbines outweigh this harm.

Needless to say the Totnes Renewable Energy Society, who have been working with onshore wind farm developers Infinergy on the proposal, were not entirely happy with that outcome. According to their website:

We are naturally disappointed by the SHDC decision but not surprised. Local planning authorities don't yet have the tools to balance parochial concerns against national strategic objectives for deployment of renewable energy.

They go on to state that:

Most MW-scale planning applications are decided on appeal. Onwards and upwards!

which rather suggests that an appeal against the council's decision will be forthcoming in the near future.  However when I spoke to TRESOC they told me that a decision about whether to appeal had not been taken as yet, and would be ultimately be made after discussions with Infinergy.

Something else that wasn't permitted on Wednesday was recording of the committee's deliberations. However the following record of some events both within and outside the council chamber was made:

Here's how Harberton Parish Councillor Tim Padfield summed up the issues for the benefit of the committee (from around 6:00 in the video):

Industrial devices provide to all the opponents of the turbines both their immediate surroundings and their enviable standard of living. Their televisions, toasters and hair dryers may not be crude designs, but we can be sure they've all been made somewhere over the horizon, out of sight. The electricity to activate these industrial devices also comes from power stations, over the horizon, out of sight. Some people here like it that way, defending their Arcadian idyll, none of whose practical comforts have been made anywhere near their green acres. Other people, I'm glad to say, see an opportunity to contribute back to the common good by using our local natural asset, abundant wind, to fuel the most benign and graceful technology ever devised to generate electric power.

In 1968 Garrett Hardin published an influential and now classic article entitled "The Tragedy of the Commons". This is the phenomenon that individual selfishness and greed in exploiting an asset common to all mankind eventually destroys that asset. We see this happening now in our exhaustion, over a few generations, of fossil fuel accumulated over millions of years. Now, the opponents of wind turbines are adding a further, bitter twist to this tragedy by opposing exploitation of an inexhaustible natural asset, the wind passing over our land.

Tim's final hope that:

Both electricity and a powerful message will go out from us, over the horizon.

has yet to be fulfilled. There's still that appeal to be considered of course, but for the moment the message heading over the horizon from the South Hams is that, as Tim Padfield paraphrased it:

If you can place yourself anywhere on public land where a historic structure is visible in the same field of view as a wind turbine, the turbine must go.

BBC Devon report today that:

A countryside group has raised concerns about Devon farmland being taken out of food production for solar farms.

The "countryside group" the BBC is referring to is in fact The Campaign to Protect Rural England. According to the BBC, Penny Mills from the CPRE has said that:

Farmland should be producing food, that's traditionally what it's done and the concern is this is so large… where is this going to stop? We should be supporting local producers. We need food and we have a growing population.

The BBC has solicited the views of other interested parties, and they also reveal that Dr Jonathan Scurlock, chief policy advisor on renewable energy for the National Farmer's Union believes that:

Solar is very efficient in terms of the amount of energy that can be produced.  Most solar farms are on low-grade land and can bring a modest income to the farmer.

More on Food Production Fears Over Devon Solar Farms

According to the Teignbridge District Council planning web site Lightsource Renewable Energy have just withdrawn their application to construct a  54 acre, 10.7 MW solar PV farm between Dunchideock and Ide in Devon. The withdrawal notice reads as follows:

Further to our phone conversation, I write to formally withdraw our application for a solar farm at Bowhay Farm.

Please do not hesitate to contact me if you require anything further.

Sent from my Windows Phone

On reading this I phoned Teignbridge DC planning department to enquire if such a brief note does in fact constitute a formal withdrawal of a major planning application. I was assured that it is indeed sufficient. I further enquired if they could throw any light on Lightsource's decision to withdraw their application. Their reply consisted of words to the effect that:

They must have gained the impression that we're not keen on this sort of development.

I also phoned Lightsource in an endeavour to discover the reason for their apparently sudden change of mind. They have yet to return my call. Whatever Lightsource's reasons, it seems like the right decision based on our somewhat unscientific straw poll, the final results of which look like this:

The final results of the econnexus Bowhay Farm solar park poll

The minutes of the meeting of the Teignbridge District Council planning committee held on November 26th have now been published. For some strange reason their coverage of my own contribution to those events is rather brief. It reads as follows:

Public Speaker: Objector, Mr Hunt – Objected to the proposal. However his objections did not raise any planning reasons to refuse the application. He urged the Applicant to withdraw the application.

You can read most of what I actually said at the meeting in a previous post, where you will note that I actually urged Inazin Solar to:

Stop wasting everybody else's time and money, withdraw this frivolous, free of charge application.  Do the same for the ongoing appeal

Inazin didn't withdraw their second planning application for a large scale solar photovoltaic park at Gold's Cross Hill, or indeed their appeal against Teignbridge's rejection of their first application. As previously reported, both were ultimately rejected, although lots of time and money were wasted in the processes.  On this particular occasion Inazin's representative said instead (according to the minutes, and amongst other things) that:

Extensive research and investigation is undertaken to find suitable sites. The proposal would provide power for 1400 homes.

That brings us on to the one new planning reason I felt sure I had brought up at the meeting, when I waved the offending paperwork at the assembled throng. Since nobody seems to have noticed I'll go over it one more time.  In an email to Teignbridge District Council dated 8th November 2012 15:31 Inazin made a number of statements in support of their argument that "there are a number of technical constraints which restrict the potential locations of sites". More specifically they stated that:

One of the most significant is the proximity to a good grid connection, this is usually to a 33kv or 132kv line in order to have the capacity for the level of power produced. Smaller sites, such as those that have been allowed to the east of Tedburn St Mary, are able to connect to an 11kv line, which has more limited capacity.

and that:

The grid connection also has to be in an area where the power produced can be used locally, as power cannot be fed back beyond the local substation to the main grid. In the case of the application site, this is located between Tedburn St Mary and Cheriton Bishop, both of which would use the power.

Inazin included in that document a map purporting to show high voltage overhead electricity cables and electricity substations in the vicinity of Tedburn St. Mary and the Fulford Estate, but they left out some significant details. Here's a much better approximation to where the relevant wires and substations are actually located:

[map style="width: 540px; height:415px; margin:10px 1px 10px 1px; border: 1px solid black;" address="tedburn st mary" maptype="HYBRID" z="12" kml="https://econnexus.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/Combined.kml"]

The green line shows (roughly!) where the 33 kV overhead cables carrying electricity from the proposed solar park towards Tedburn St. Mary go, and the red line shows where 11 kV cables go.  Assuming Inazin really intended the Fulford Solar Park to power the homes and businesses of Tedburn, any electricity generated would need to firstly course through the green cables in an easterly direction, go straight through the Winslake Foot switching substation, then turn north to head for the Folly Bridge substation. There the 33 kV is transformed down to 11 kV, and the red cables come into play. They go back south again to Tedburn St. Mary, where a number of secondary substations transform the voltage down to 240 volts for consumption by the residents of Tedburn, not to mention keeping the lights on in the Winslake Foot substation. According to Google that's a total of 12 kilometers, almost half of which is at 11 kV.

It is evident to me, and hopefully to you also by now, that if this planning application is anything to go by Inazin Solar not only have great difficulty in distinguishing between a megawatt and a megawatt-hour, they also have no idea how their proposed solar park and the "main grid" to which they hoped to connect it actually operate. If you're not yet convinced please feel free to comment below, and I'll endeavour to explain in more detail. I'd also be grateful if you could explain to me why a demonstrably incompetent developer doesn't constitute a valid reason for refusing a major planning application.

Be that as it may, I do have to admit that my somewhat theatrical expression of my frustration at all this nonsense didn't endear me to all members of the planning committee. No doubt astonished by the novelty of my presentation, Councillor Jackie Brodie said that while she was starting to take on board some of my objections to the proposal, she felt that others were "poppycock". As you have probably gathered by now, my opinion is that Inazin are in fact the ones talking poppycock about solar PV. Jackie has since apologised to me in writing for this no doubt uncharacteristic outburst, going on to say that:

I believe we are essentially both on the same side, I hope so anyway, fighting to save the planet and secure our future energy security, whilst tackling climate change. I hope we can both continue to work towards that.

I hope so too, always remembering not to forget about the nation's food security of course, in the face of ever more extreme weather.

As the northern hemisphere hurricane season finishes, so thing start to warm up in the southern hemisphere.  The first named tropical cyclone in the 2012/13 season in the South Pacific is Cyclone Evan. According to Al Jazeera Evan has already devastated Samoa, as you can see:

Evan is now strengthening further, and is currently forecast by the JTWC to pass just north of Fiji later today, with maximum gusts of 135 knots:

The 5 day forecast for Cyclone Evan on Sunday 16th December 2012

In some good news for those who, like me, oppose large scale solar PV parks on what assorted planning regulations refer to as "our best and most versatile agricultural land", the Planning Inspectorate have dismissed Inazin Solar's appeal against the decision of Teignbridge District Council to refuse planning permission for the 40 acre Fulford Solar Park at Gold's Cross Hill near Tedburn St. Mary.  The inspector needed to make two site visits since he:

Visited the site on 16 November, but visibility was limited by fog, and so I made another visit on 21 November 2012.

According to the inspector's report:

The main issues in this appeal are the effects of the proposed development on the character and appearance of the area, and whether the benefits of the scheme would be sufficient to outweigh any harm that might be caused.

Assessing the benefits of the scheme the inspector says that:

The appeal scheme would make a significant contribution to national renewable energy targets and to energy security, and would make a valuable contribution to the rural economy.

whilst on the debit side of the planning balance he says that:

I consider that the proposed development would, by reason of its nature, size and location, have a substantial and harmful effect on the character and appearance of the area. I find that the proposal would conflict with the underlying objectives of SP Policies CO1 and CO4, and LP Policies ENV1, ENV3 and ENV4, to conserve landscape quality, which is an aim that is broadly consistent with the National Planning Policy Framework.

When finally weighing up all the pros and cons the inspector reaches the following conclusion:

Core principles of planning set out in the NPPF include encouraging the use of renewable resources, for example by the development of RE, and recognising the intrinsic character and beauty of the countryside. The NPPF also provides that the planning system should contribute to and enhance the natural and local environment by, amongst other things, protecting and enhancing valued landscapes. PPS22CG recognises that the landscape and visual effects will only be one consideration to be taken into account and that these must be considered alongside the wider environmental, economic and social benefits that arise from RE projects. Significant weight should be given to the RE, GHG and economic benefits of the proposed development. It would make an important contribution to meeting RE targets. However, in my judgement, the substantial harm to the character and appearance of the area that would result from this scheme would outweigh the benefits. The adverse impacts I have identified are not acceptable and could not be made so. I find that the planning balance here falls against granting planning permission. The proposal would conflict with the development plan,
and would not accord with the NPPF when read as a whole.

So there you have it. This appeal has been dismissed, and the second planning application on the same site has also been refused by the Teignbridge DC planning committee. Next on the agenda, for those of us in Teignbridge at least, looks likely to be the planning committee meeting that considers the Bowhay Farm solar park planning application. Personally I have severe doubts about the supposed renewable energy, greenhouse gas and economic benefits of such developments. Unfortunately it looks as though the Planning Inspectorate does not share those reservations.