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The Bradworthy Wind Turbines

click here for the December edition of Greenlines (Acrobat PDF format, 698kb)

A Green Knight for Westminster? Some musings from PPC Ricky Knight

That is the chivalrous battle-cry, a galvanising slogan to rally the faithful, rescue all those in distress, while on the search for electoral success.

Campaigning has begun too, at a modest pace. We had a quick refresher on the Target to Win Strategy, four of us travelling up to Norwich for a forum led by the seriously effective Norwich Green Party. And yet the concept is hardly rocket science - it's based on simple door-knocking! The difference being that you jettison any pretensions of being able to do, for instance, all 48,000 households in the North Devon constituency. You concentrate instead on one or two choice wards, campaigning year-round and building support over a series of years and elections.

We've also been to Tiverton for an excellent meeting on Wind Power organised by Yes2Wind and regional Greenpeace groups. This was a timely opportunity to gather really useful information on wind energy, in the light of the Fullabrook scheme near Barnstaple, and also to make some useful campaigning contacts. Certainly the fact sheets that were distributed have given me the impetus to wholeheartedly support the scheme.

The Green Party National Conference at Weston-super-mare was extremely successful and very well attended. The venue was good and, despite there being no top-drawer "name" speakers, the speeches, debates and various fringe events were informative and energising. One highlight was a presentation by the New Economics Foundation on their "Well-being manifesto"; based on the wonderfully simple and demonstrable fact that human happiness can't be measured by economics, and asking the question "What would politics look like if promoting people's well-being was one of government's main aims?". Perhaps the morning after the rocking Saturday night was not the best time for the SW GP AGM, but it was nonetheless very well attended and gave me the opportunity to seriously over-run my allotted time with a farewell speech as regional co-ordinator.

Our name's been kept alive in the press because of renewable energy projects such as the Fullabrook Wind Turbine scheme, up on the hill out of Barnstaple near Marwood. This is not a small scheme, but with an output of 66 MW it will provide clean power for all the homes in North Devon. Like Biomass, wind energy has unearthed very strong opposition. Fortunately, I have never been put off by opposition. We have chosen this scheme as the campaigning message for our "Target to Win" strategy in the Newport area, the ward that I represent as a Barnstaple Town Councillor. There are about 1500 houses in this ward and so far, in four week-ends, we have managed to knock on just over 10% of the doors. The results of our door-to-door opinion poll reflect the national figures from MORI and NOP, although our high percentage in support (89%) no doubt reflects the fact that the team doing all the hard work, that's me, L'Anne, Jon, Kevin, Fiona, Laura and Heather (thanks to all of you!) are in favour too.

Thanks too to Rosemary, our secretary, for suggesting the new venue for our AGM. A good turn-out meant we were able to elect a full-team of officers, including two new officers, Kevin McAllen as Treasurer and Ann Wotton, who expressed a wish to be involved in research to assist us in our campaigns. It has to be said, it is always a relief after every NDGP AGM to be able to say, once again, that the group is alive and well for at least another year, that new members are becoming actively involved and old timers still have life left in them!

The next twelve months?

The paragraphs above are retrospective, so let's talk up the immediate future: this week will see our first "Green Fayre". Well, the hall is booked, it's really nice too! Central, roomy, cosy and a plum pre-Christmas date. The stalls are booked (thanks due to Ian who organises the Health And Harmony weekends at Tapeley); there's no entrance fee; there'll be food and drink, raffles and loads of seasonal gifts to purchase from sound Green stall-holders. How miserable will we be if you guys don't support us? So please be there, tell your friends, bring the family. Doors open at 10.00 am and we'll keep going till at least 3.30 pm. We are hoping to make this an annual event, maybe even trying to get one together for Easter too. Maybe someone reading this has a stall to bring along too - get in touch. But most importantly, turn up. We need LOADSA money for our double election campaign - this Green Fayre could help us on our way very nicely.

We have managed to get hold of an excellent BWEA (British Wind Energy Association) exhibition of 15 x A1 "arty" photos of wind turbines. We have even more astonishingly managed to get these displayed at Barnstaple, Braunton and Ilfracombe libraries for several weeks in December! Please try and pop in to any or all three places and add your comments to the sheets.

Mike Harrison has been willingly cajoled into standing in the Braunton East bye-election (which we actually forced, by daring to prevent the cosy co-option of a Lib-Dem to replace Peter Ruddick). Mike will be campaigning unashamedly for the Fullabrook wind turbines, amongst other things. He has got his election pamphlet together and will be hitting the streets as of now. Again, help is needed - please put yourselves forward to help us - this is the first bye-election we have ever fought in North Devon and certainly the first we have ever "called". Talking of elections, it's not just Westminster next year, but on May 5th, there are the Devon County elections too. We are seriously looking for individuals to stand for these, you know. Think about it. In a relative sense, we are on a roll - we just need to keep the name alive at the Ballot Box.

You are cordially invited to a New Year's Green Party at Ricky and L'Anne's place on Saturday, 22nd January, from 7.30 - LATE! This will be a fund raiser so there will be a charge of £10 per person but I tell you what, the food'll be worth twice that! There'll be mulled wine and drinks too but bring a bottle to help supplies. Let there be Music and Great Company - but no speeches. Come dressed up in a bit (or a lot!) of green, please. Also, let us know that you'll be coming.

The Target to Win strategy will continue - we are heavily reliant upon volunteers willing to door-knock. It can be strangely rewarding on many levels. We will also need leafleters too, increasingly so as the day approaches.

That'll do for now - but remember my lament from the last newsletter - my biggest fear is being ignored and marginalised. Please try and get me some invitations. I need to get out more!

The Next Industrial Revolution

by Rosemary King

I have been following with interest the debate of renewable energy vs reduced consumption. Maybe some lateral thinking would be useful. I personally don't think that being more economical with resources is going to be the way forward - eventually we will still run out. I don't think it is being realistic to expect people to consume less, we live in a world full of consumerism and short of a major catastrophe people will just carry on doing what they do - consume.

The following is not about either wind farms or biomass, but it made me feel a little more optimistic. I listened, by chance to the end of a programme "Costing the Earth" on BBC Radio 4. "Cradle to Cradle" technology was being discussed as well as "Shape Memory Polymers" and I realised that there is a lot of new research being done that could revolutionise our industrial world. In the opinion of Bill McDonough, co-author of the book "Cradle to Cradle", eco-efficiency or "Reduce, Reuse, Recycle" can give only an illusion of change and doesn't solve the problems of unsustainable manufacturing.

McDonough's company MBDC explains on their website:

"Cradle to Cradle Design is a fundamental conceptual shift away from the flawed system design of the Industrial Revolution. Instead of designing products and systems based on the take-make-waste model of the last century ('cradle to grave'), MBDC's Cradle to Cradle Design paradigm is powering the Next Industrial Revolution, in which products and services are designed based on patterns found in nature, eliminating the concept of waste entirely and creating an abundance that is healthy and sustaining. Eco-Effectiveness is MBDC's design strategy for realizing these results by optimizing materials to be food either for nature's ecosystems or for humans' industrial systems—perpetually circulating in closed systems that create value and are inherently healthy and safe."
One example of this technology in practice comes from a pioneering company in Switzerland that produces a sustainably grown wool and ramie fabric. The residue from this production is drinking quality water and scraps that become compostable crop insulation.
" Long-term prosperity depends not on the efficiency of a fundamentally destructive system, but on the effectiveness of processes designed to be healthy and renewable in the first place."

"The next Industrial Revolution... eliminates the concept of waste, uses energy from renewable sources, and celebrates cultural and biological diversity."

One of the key words in this seems to be disassembly - manufacturing consumables that can be disassembled and then totally used to feed the next consumable in a closed loop, or to feed back into the planet. Waste is Food, or nutrients for other processes. So called 'smart materials', are one of the means of achieving this. These include shape memory polymers that resume their original shape when heated, and when used for key fixtures, can enable easy disassembling of products into their reusable parts.
I feel that we cannot return to a pre industrial state and perhaps 'cradle to cradle' points a way forward to integrating industry into a sustainable future.

For more information, mbdc.com is a good starting point.

A New Approach to the Election Leaflet?

by Mike Harrison

The Braunton Parish Council by-election will be an interesting one to contest. The planning application for one of Britain's biggest onshore wind farms has been lodged and two thirds of it will be in the parish.

But the obvious Green Party leaflet with a headline "Yes to Fullabrook", or similar, would probably hit the bin before it hit the mat in a lot of households. With bullets or headings, these may be all that is read. How do you get people to read text? The letters page of the Journal evidently gets attention and there is also clear interest in novels. My conclusion: write plain text and fiction. Thus my Braunton leaflet for the election of 9th December is a fictional conversation set in December 2015. It is saying what a fine place Braunton is and how people liked the wind farm, no bypass, no Tesco and so on. And they cycled everywhere! Illustrations are very plain, line drawn text breakers and no mugshots - nothing to distract from the ideas included. All printed on green paper of course.

Only two candidates and very low turnout inevitable, so it seemed worth a try. Maybe someone will read it!

Peace and Understanding

by Jon Hooper

I have realised that we all arrive in the Green Party from different backgrounds and motivations. Climate Change, Conservation, Organic Food, Pollution, Ethics and Community Spirit are some common reasons for us to support the Green Party. The Green issues which drive us as individuals can sometimes conflict.

It would be so nice to believe the "Green" choice is always clear and obvious, that the manifesto and philosophical basis describe both our green utopia and the road to reach it. I no longer believe this as blindly as I once did. It is acknowledged by those who write our party literature that our manifesto contains some of the most mature policies of any party, but also several policies that are in their infancy. The manifesto is not gospel, it is a living, growing set of ideas which are only useful when applied with due care and understanding.

Let's not beat each other over the head with our singular favourite policies. I've seen environmental groups such as CPRE and FOE fight for the dominance of their core environmental tenets in the public eye. I've seen leading Green Party policy makers meet new ideas with closed minds. I've seen issues debated at conference that divide the party in two. To idolise any one or two green principles, to interpret any passage of the manifesto as a command would be akin to religious fundamentalism. Could we end up with several denominations? "Grass-roots Green"; "Green for Go"; "Clean Green"; "Absolute Green"; "Healthy Green"?

As we've witnessed recently, Renewable Energy projects can lead to a conflict between Climate Change and Conservation issues. Development projects - such as the downstream bridge - lead to conflicts between community demands and conservation. Immigration issues bring the self-determination of local communities into conflict with social ethics. Local vs Global; Rights vs Freedoms; Conservation vs Progress: in the real world conflicting interests abound.

As more and more Greens are elected to positions of responsibility, they will find themselves faced with making decisions where no one choice is the only "Green" choice. The very best of these Green politicians will be (and are) those who most fully comprehend and appreciate as many different perspectives as possible. Even more importantly they will be sufficiently aware of their own personal biases and motivations to counter their own knee-jerk responses. These politicians will stand out from candidates from other parties because not only will they make well-rounded choices; they will also have the vision, learning and imagination to invent a better future, and to take successful steps towards it.

To sweep under the carpet the differences of opinion and conflicts which are arising in the Party would, in my opinion, be a waste of this opportunity to become better politicians and citizens. The challenge for all of us is to acknowledge our own personal biases, then to spend time understanding other people's points of view. If we can all learn to listen as much as we speak, I will have hope for the future.

Update On The Fullabrook Down Windfarm Planning Application

by Rosemary Brian

The planning application for this wind farm has been submitted by the developers, Devon Wind Power, directly to the Department of Trade and Industry [DTI]. The public were asked to submit their views on the application by 12th November.

I made a submission myself to the DTI supporting the wind farm application. This gives me the right to appear at the public enquiry [when it is held, probably next summer] and make my case in support of the proposals, in person.

I phoned the DTI to ask them how things were going. They advised me that they had received 360 submissions against the proposals, and 18 in favour. Their first priority was to sift through all the submissions against the proposals. This was to make sure that any relevant facts about the proposals which were deleterious to local people living near the wind farm were fully taken account of.

The relevant impression that was being garnered by the DTI was the likely adverse effect that the wind farm would have on tourism. In getting this point across so effectively to the DTI, the protesters have done a very good job. So a situation of 'we don't want an industrial size wind farm in our midst' has been successfully transmogrified into 'the tourists wont want to see an industrial size wind farm in their midst when they visit the area on holiday'. Nice one.

Because the application has come to the DTI in 'bits and pieces', the local authority consultees, North Devon District Council, and the Devon County Council, have been given extended the time to consider the proposals and submit their responses. They now have until the end of February to make their reply to the DTI. The public consultation period has also been extended to 6th December.

It is likely that the minister at the DTI in charge will order a public enquiry to be held in the summer, probably in June 2005. Tighten your seat belts, this will be a long and bumpy ride.

Report on the Braunton Bye-Election

by Rosemary Brian

As luck would have it, a local LibDem councillor on the Braunton Parish Council resigned his seat in October. Braunton is the Parish where the opposition to the Fullabrook Down windfarm is at its most vociferous. It is proposed that thirteen of the twenty two wind turbines will be situated within the Braunton Parish.

It was into this lion's den that Green Party Campaigns Co-ordinator, Mike Harrison, threw his hat. He decided to take the argument for wind turbines, among other green issues, into deepest enemy territory.

Polling day for this bye election is 9th December. Mike and I have been delivering Mike's election address around the parish. Unfortunately, because of an error by the election staff at the Civic Centre, Mike has not been able to use the Green Party label on the ballot paper. They are being printed with a blank against Mikes name. The deputy returning officer has apologised in the North Devon Journal for this mistake. If we think that it is going to effect the outcome of the election we have the right of appeal to an election court.

Turnout for the election is expected to be low. Will Mike make it into double figures? He certainly deserves to. This will hopefully be the start of a Green Campaign in Braunton. There are plenty of issues to fight on locally.

Handyperson Scheme

by Ann Wotton

When I lived in Mid Devon the council ran a Handyperson Scheme at affordable prices. North Devon needs such a scheme for those who don't feel they qualify for help from Age Concern etc. Another lady who used to live in Mid Devon suggested there must be a 'cartel' up here. It seems impossible to get small jobs done without being 'ripped off'. We have not encountered fair hourly or daily rates; just quotes, which turn out to be extortionate.

What about resurrecting the good old 'Bob-a-Job' scheme the scouts had?

Are there any 'boy scouts' out there with some free time to put up shelves, do some gardening etc? It could be a way to raise funds for the local Green Party. If anyone is interested I would be willing to co-ordinate things - call me on 01271 374014.

And here's a way car-sharers could be doubly 'Green' by donating contributions towards their petrol. I told a dear elderly lady in the village who had just missed the bus that I would be willing to take a group of them shopping. She insisted that she would want to contribute to the petrol. So if they each put the bus fare in a 'Green' tin that could be a trickle of funding on a regular basis.

Green Energy Conference

by Jon Hooper

Three of us from the local Party attended the South West Green Energy Conference in Plymouth, hosted by RegenSW. Thanks to Clive Jones for providing transport, and thanks to Greenpeace for paying our entrance fees.

Rebecca Heaton, a consultant, gave a presentation on small-scale Biomass Combined Heat and Power [CHP] schemes in the South West. She had been asked by RegenSW to investigate the viability of smaller schemes. She said that currently there are no small-scale CHP plants in the South West. She had found that smaller schemes are less economically viable. Only with an adjacent industry to use the heat can a CHP plant as small as 1MW prove economic to build and run. Smaller schemes are only attractive in areas where mains gas isn't available, and only then with a 50% capital grant.

Dr Catherine Mitchell gave a presentation titled "Can renewables stop the lights going out?" She said that "intermittency" of renewable energy is not a problem - up to 60% of our electricity sources can be intermittent without it becoming an issue. Better management and upgrading of the national grid is the real key to stopping the lights going out. She asserted that diversity is a strength, and having a multitude of RE schemes is better for reliability than a few big conventional power stations.

Energy Minister Mike O'Brien gave a brief speech and I took some interesting quotes:

"Britain should play a leadership role"

"only wind will let us meet the 2010 target (for 10% of energy to come from renewable sources)"

"We can't develop (wind) in the southwest offshore"

"The price of refusing wind farms (climate change) will be met by local people..."

Tony Juniper, director of Friends Of The Earth [FOE] was the most eagerly anticipated speaker in favour of renewable energy. He didn't disappoint, making strong statements such as "in the real world we have to embrace all renewable technologies." He pointed out the injustice in climate change, as we, the perpetrators, are least affected. Global Warming is causing crop failure in the areas of largest population expansion in the World, he revealed, and Climate disasters are responsible for 99 out of 100 deaths in developing countries.

Those in opposition to Renewable Energy schemes are championing nuclear power in particular. Tony Juniper said that FOE are against nuclear power. If we were to double our nuclear capacity, it would only reduce UK CO2 emissions by 8% he claimed, and the money would be better spent on renewables. He also reminded us that Nuclear power is intrinsically linked to war, and that we can't ban Nuclear power abroad if we keep it ourselves. Nuclear power is not as "clean" as some say, as it does use energy in side processes, and of course creates radioactive pollution.

Clare from the Regional Development Agency gave an overview of the future for the south west, and told us that lots of investment is going into offshore renewable energy solutions, including an offshore "wave hub" which up to four projects could plug into. The "wave hub" is basically four sockets and a cable leading onshore to the national grid, and providing such a connection could half the capital costs of some offshore projects. The RDA would like the SW to aim to produce 30MW of wave power by 2008, although this was said to be ambitious.

The focal event of the conference was a debate titled "Are wind turbines a blot on the landscape?" It didn't turn out to be as interesting as it might have been, as the audience was predominantly pro-wind (though this does reflect the national statistics) and the speakers against wind didn't find any of their arguments carrying any weight with those present.

A speaker from the "Realistic Energy Forum" gave the following arguments against wind turbines: the only people in favour of RE are those who want to make money from it; thousands of scientists disagree with the idea of climate change; Estate Agents say property prices can go down by 40% because of wind farms; surveys showing the majority support wind power are usually biased in their wording. He was asked by a member of the audience whether it was mainly the older generation that opposed wind farms. He replied that we shouldn't pay much attention to young people because "The younger people are, the less they know". Don't worry, he got loads of "boo"s from the audience for that statement!

The editor of Country Life was the main advertised speaker against wind turbines, but he'd backed out and a representative of the Campaign to Protect Rural England [CPRE] took his place. The representative said, with regard to wind turbines: CPRE believe in conservation of energy as the solution; he has yet to be persuaded that wind turbines save CO2 energy (he quoted a statement from a Danish company, which has turned out to be a misquote: It was said that Denmark's wind turbines aren't leading to any reduction in CO2 output from the country's conventional power stations. Apparently this is true, but only because they continue to produce power and export it to adjacent countries for a profit!); he also had worries about low frequency noise. He refused however to back the claim that wind turbines were a "blot on the landscape", and several CPRE members in the audience stood up and said they thought wind turbines could be quite nice-looking.

The panel of pro-wind experts was asked about possible house price depreciation, and replied that statistics showed house prices first dropping and then rising again once wind turbines became established. As always, statistics can be found to support any argument, but are often quoted out of the wider context. In response to another question, we were assured that the energy used to construct and deploy a wind turbine is paid back in just five months of operation.

Tony Juniper of FOE gave a well thought-out response to the question "Are wind turbines a blot on the landscape?" He pointed out that there used to be fifteen thousand windmills in the UK, and they were an accepted and beautiful part of the landscape. He said that some people are losing their countries through rising sea levels, and that this is not fair. He said that the real "blots on the landscape" are Hinkley and other nuclear & coal power stations, not to mention the industrialisation of farming and effects of acid rain.

Website designed by Jon Hooper

Published and promoted by Jon Hooper, 3 Elizabeth Court, Well Street, Torrington EX38 8EP on behalf of the North Devon Green Party, 1 Taw View Terrace, Bishops Tawton, EX32 0AW

PLEASE NOTE: Not all of the material presented on this site is necessarily Green Party Policy or endorsed by The Green Party.