Dunning Parish Historical Society in Perthshire Scotland has local Dunning history data including dunning village census and grave yard geneaology records Dunning history society logo text

Dunning's History Now - August 2003

Wind Turbines for Dunning?

The letter from Bob Neish in the Summer 2003 Dunningite was probably the first that most Dunning people heard of the proposal to build a 'wind farm' in the hills south of Dunning. Indeed it seems that most villagers took little notice, and the few who expressed an opinion appeared to think it would have little effect on the village.

montage of St Serf's and a turbine 5.49kb jpg

The local action group has circulated a picture comparing a turbine with the 73ft height of St Serf's church tower. 

But the folk who live in these hills and make their living from them clearly have serious concerns regarding such things as noise, water pollution and destruction of the visual beauty of the landscape, and have formed an action group to fight the proposal.

For these are not small machines (such as those existing at Sutra). They will be among the largest in Britain. The project manager of the company behind the proposal has said that each turbine has 40m blades on a tower 80m high giving a total height of 120metres and requires a concrete base 16m square by 2.5 to 3m deep. His plan is for 29 such turbines, with associated roads, sub-stations and power lines.

Village View Montage 12.1kb jpg

The map provided by the project manager suggests that 12 or 13 turbines might be visible in this view of Dunning. The altitude of Montalt and Balquhandy is 220m above Dunning, so the turbines will appear to be more than half the height of these hills, and double the height of the recently built 60m anemometer tower in the centre of the photo.
This is one person's expectation of how the turbines might look as you approach Dunning from the north.

And his scheme is not the only one - it seems that at least four other companies have similar plans and that in total there might be as many as 200 of these huge machines on our local hills by next summer.

There is a great deal of information readily available from people who object to such schemes, who say they are inefficient and unreliable compared to alternatives such as tidal power, and make a very strong case against their use anywhere at all, never mind on sites of great scenic beauty near where people and animals live. By contrast the supporters of such schemes appear to have little to say.

Will they be built? Or will the local objectors' group win the day? The landscape and views of Dunning would be greatly changed; whether for better or worse will surely be a matter of personal opinion.

DPHS as a historical society will take no active political stance (though probably many of its members will). However, we will watch with interest and record for the future what might be the largest local 'History Now' story of all time.


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