North Sutherland and Caithness at 'tipping point' with onshore wind turbines
Register for free to read more of the latest local news. It's easy and will only take a moment.
A tipping point has been reached with new onshore wind farms in the far north of mainland Scotland, it is being claimed.
According to Armadale resident Detta Velvis, the rapid roll-out of new developments over the past decade has now reached saturation level.
Ms Velvis is helping spearhead opposition to a planned new scheme which would see nine turbines loom over her home village in north Sutherland.
She believes that people are increasingly coming to realise that the financial incentives offered by wind farm developers are not worth the damage being wrought on the landscape.
She said the concerns of Armadale Windfarm Action Group are shared by communities throughout the far north.
Ms Velvis, who runs a B&B at Armadale House, said: "I think we are at a turning point in the wind farm exploitation of the area.
"People initially only noticed the big community benefit funds wind farms brought in.
"A new village hall, the start up of a development trust, the monthly lunch clubs and other initiatives in the community, financed by hand-outs by the big multi-nationals behind the turbines.
"But, more and more, I see negative comments about their impact."
Ms Velvis said people are now having to live with the cumulative effect of the schemes which have sprung up in recent years.
"There are pylons all over the place," she said. "Driving from here to Thurso has changed dramatically in the last two years.
"There are the high, metal pylons from Dounreay and from Baillie wind farm and the wooden pylons on the back road to Thurso.
"Driving that road, there is almost no place where the horizon is not interrupted by pylons or turbines. At Westfield it is almost too much for the eye to cope with."
Ms Velvis has welcomed support for her group's campaign from the community councils representing the nearby villages of Bettyhill, Melvich and Reay.
All of these, she pointed out, are the subject of new turbine ventures.
Developers, she claimed, are expert at mounting "charm offensives" to lure communities with incentives to support their schemes.
"For them, it is all about financial handouts, not what their schemes will do to our beautiful landscape," she said.
"The multi-nationals are very happy to pay the community a tiny bit of the profits to make themselves extremely rich."
Brookfield Renewable recently dropped three turbines from the Armadale scheme in response to feedback about its original planning application.
The nine 150-metre high turbines are earmarked to go up on hill land and common grazings overlooking Armadale and the A836.
Brookfield is happy the development can go ahead without undue impact on the landscape or the community.
If approved, it would operate a community benefit fund worth up to £215,000 per annum.
