No Oddie life's too short to have the protracted debates you so obviously relish.
I have given my opinion and that is all I wish to do.

Victors Mate wrote:No Oddie life's too short to have the protracted debates you so obviously relish.

Nothing to do with protracted debates..............just an attempt to make some people see that a few windfarms are acceptable, even attractive, in one area.....................but some areas are being used as places to dump windmills to cover for the fact that areas like Essex have one windfarm consisting of 2 turbines, in fact, many "windfarms" only have one or two turbines, and the West Midlands has nary a one!

I'd be quite happy with 18 windfarms in Caithness...............if they only had one or two turbines.

Totally agree with you, Sass. I am disillusioned with both the major parties - not much to choose between them !

....and don't forget that our Prime Misleader also wants to sell uranium to China. I haven't heard the Opposition's views on that yet.

I am moving this over to debates too because I think folk might want to continue talking about this one.

Oddquine wrote:just an attempt to make some people see that a few windfarms are acceptable, even attractive, in one area.....................but some areas are being used as places to dump windmills
I'd be quite happy with 18 windfarms in Caithness...............if they only had one or two turbines.

Sounds like a job for - - - - - - Donald MacQuixote.

Coal can be mined and utilized - cleanly and safely - these days, without disrupting the environment. If we can dig huge tunnels under the sea, we can dig coal, using similar machinery. We are sitting on the stuff and it is crazy not to use it - cleanly and safely -

Wave power does not just benefit coastal areas. It is added to the national grid, for everyone's benefit, in the whole country.

New homes should have full insulation and solar panels incorporated, 'dynamic' boilers that produce electricity, water storage tanks under the garage. That would make them virtually independent, for energy. Grants exist for older homes.

What is rarely mentioned, is hydropower. The cleanest form of energy production, of all. Not the huge dams, that destroy entire regions - but smaller systems, in each area.

Any city of town that is near the sea, or near a river, or near a large lake can build an hydropower station, by digging large vertical tunnels and directing some of the water onto powerful turbines below, producing electricity for the whole district. In many parts of the Continent, that has existed for nearly a century.

The water is not 'lost', it returns from whence it came. The ecology of the area is not damaged, because the water is abstracted safely, often as part of flood defences. Thus killing two large stones with one little bird. Avoiding the costly floods that are such regular and miserable yearly events, for many people, whilst producing constant and clean energy.

By comparison, wind turbines produce a minute amount of energy, for the sheer disruption they cause to the environment When the wind don't blow, they produce ZILCH. Apart from hugely expensive maintenance.

Like a circle in a spiral
Like a wheel within a wheel
Never ending or beginning
On an ever-spinning reel
As the images unwind
Like the circles that you find
In the windmills of your mind

Anya wrote:By comparison, wind turbines produce a minute amount of energy, for the sheer disruption they cause to the environment When the wind don't blow, they produce ZILCH. Apart from hugely expensive maintenance.

Up here, when the wind gets too strong, the computer in Belgium stops the blades.....................so when the wind blows too much they also produce................ZILCH!

Whereas domestic turbines, if you get the right kind, just flex the blades and continue producing.

Wind Power is NOT an answer to reducing environmentally unfriendly electricity production except as an individual/community choice in individual/community circumstances with direct input to the grid at the place of production or with the use of battery banks.

It is neither cost effective OR environmentally friendly to produce it hundreds of miles from where it is to be used.

VM - 'tis a nice little toon. Was it meant to be an educated and considered response?

Is Victor still your mate? Or anyone?

I have given my opinion and that is all I wish to do.

Anya I see no reason to dignify your attempt to attack the poster not the posting.

I agree with you VM - We should respect the views of others, whether or not we share those views.

I agree with Oddie too, absolutely - Local communities should have the ultimate say on what is done in their name AND with their money. Politicians come and go, their mistakes remain forever.

There is still a strange attitude that, once elected, mediocre people must have - power - over the rest of us. Instead of accepting they are there to do the bidding of their paymasters (all of us). 'Civil Servants' is the term. Not 'Civil Masters'.