Decade-long wind farm extension agreed for site in Berwickshire
A decade-long extension to the lifespan of a Berwickshire wind farm has been approved – with the developer asked to consider increasing the financial benefits to the local community.
Quixwood Moor Wind Farm sits roughly 1.9 kilometres south-west of the village of Grantshouse and 1.4 kilometres north-east of Abbey St Bathans, near the A1 trunk road.
Full planning permission was granted in 2013 for the installation of 13 turbines and associated infrastructure.
The wind farm has been generating renewable electricity since 2017.
Under the current planning permission, the turbines are permitted to operate for 25 years from the date of commissioning until March 2042.
When members of Scottish Borders Council’s Planning and Building Standards Committee met on November 2, they approved plans to extend the wind farm’s operational life by a further decade until March 2052.
Cllr Marshall Douglas, SNP for Tweeddale East, said: “As this is an existing permission granted some years ago, I wonder if there is any way we could put in an informative for asking the developer to look at either increasing or changing any community benefits that relate to this scheme as it is on-going for such a period.
“We did a similar thing at Bowbeat Wind Farm I think.”
It was agreed that a request for the informative should be passed on to the developer.
Meanwhile, a Government policy of paying compensation to wind farm operators was criticised by Conservative councillor Neil Richards.
Constraint payments are compensations paid to wind farm operators to switch off their turbines when high winds generate more electricity than the outdated national transmission network can carry to cities in the south.
The total cost of these constraint and curtailment payments – reaching over £1.5billion annually in Great Britain – is added directly to household and business electricity bills.
Cllr Richards, who represents Hawick and Denholm, said: “Given that at any one time wind doesn’t blow, this means this means there are periods when the Government pays money to developers of wind farms yet, obviously, they are not economic.
“So how can we be fair about this. Personally I think they are all inefficient.”