YOUR VIEWS: Little substance in renewables scare stories
Register for free to read more of the latest local news. It's easy and will only take a moment.
According to your letters pages there is considerable outrage about plans to bolster the National Grid in these parts.
These missives often claim ‘it will destroy tourism’, ‘house prices will plummet’, ‘they are not needed’, ‘our natural environment is being destroyed’ and that good old standby, ‘it will lead to a new Highland clearances’.
Those that, like me, have been around for a few years will know that there is little substance to the scare stories being peddled.
Many will recall their parents telling them about the concerns of the devastation the hydro schemes would create, or more recently how Loch Ness was going to be surrounded by a “ring of steel” and how the upgrade of the Beauly-Denny power line would destroy much of the area.
But what has been the impact – very little.
Tourists are still coming in their droves, house prices are higher than ever and I doubt anyone can point to any substantial or lasting impact of these projects on the environment. And as for the Highland clearances, I think it is an absolute insult to the thousands of families who were forcibly removed from their land for such a comparison to be made.
Climate change is a reality.
Our children and grandchildren will never forgive us if we don’t do all we can to reduce carbon emissions and work to mitigate the worst impacts it will have. The time for campaigns to stop these developments is surely over. Let’s get on with it.
Name and address supplied
Renewable energy the only way forward
I was so saddened to read the recent letter entitled ‘How “green” are renewables?’ [The Inverness Courier, February 16] from one of your readers.
Their distorted view of what renewable energy and net zero is, is frankly very worrying and it is disturbing that someone would have such a blinkered opinion of what is actually happening in the world today.
Green renewable energy as its name implies is greener than burning fossil fuels. ‘Greener’ as they do obviously produce some carbon initially to make and install but over the lifetime of the installation, which should be 20-plus years – this being the more critical stage – is where they will reduce our carbon emissions drastically.
As renewables and technology improves, even the initial material and installation carbon emissions will also drastically reduce through green energy to produce them, such as steel.
Renewables energy is derived from natural sources such as wind, sunlight and water that are constantly replenished as opposed to coal, oil and gas which are not. Renewables are therefore cleaner and cheaper than burning fossil fuels.
That is all scientific fact.
The writer says in their letter that: “If the politicians who impose net zero policies on us, don’t know, how can we?”
Unfortunately this statement shows a total lack of understanding of what is happening.Politicians aren’t imposing renewables on us as they should. They have known for decades about the threat of global warming from burning fossil fuels.
The UN Climate Change advisory panel of scientists, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) was set up in 1988 but politicians and fossil fuel companies knew about it even before then. They know but unfortunately some powerful politicians are self-serving and intentionally misled and greenwash the public for their own ends. For example, giving out over a 100 new oil and gas exploration licences saying it would help energy security. As it normally takes over two decades from exploration to production of a new oil or gas field this is nonsense.
We don’t have to look far to see what the science is telling us, which is if we keep increasing global temperatures by burning fossil fuels we will breach the limits set by the UN Climate Change Summit in Paris in 2015 to keep global warming below 1.5°C if possible and not to go beyond 2°C.
In fact, in over the last 12 months global temperatures have increased by 1.5°C and this is reflected in the devastation that we see in extreme weather, droughts, heat waves, melting ice and sea level increases.
We in Scotland maybe suffering from the eyesores of wind turbines and pylons but we in the global developed north have caused and are still causing, the majority of global warming which affects those in the global developing south.
Some of these people are now becoming climate refugees and are having to leave their homes as rising sea levels are engulfing their low-lying lands.
Others having to move due to temperature increases which means they have no water and can’t grow food. But yes because it is happening on the other side of the world and not on our doorstep it’s not our problem. And the moral of this common story is that people need to get better informed on what is going on locally and globally and need to push politicians to make the right decisions for the right reasons unlike what is happening today.
Today it is a moral imperative for anyone who cares about future generations to ensure we phase out our use of fossil fuels as quickly as possible and increase our production of preferably publicly owned (through governments, councils or communities) green renewable energy as sensitively to nature and communities as possible.
Gary Jack, Extinction Rebellion Highlands and Islands
