More on biomass.
The postponement of the planning application by Northern Energy for a plant to generate electricity from forestry timber has seen no let-up in the work being done by the Community Council on trying to establish a factual basis on which to consider the proposal further.
A site visit was held in pouring rain on Friday September 20th, during which it became clear that the proposed development would be well screened from view from any existing road. The down-slope situation being considered is already planted with trees, most of which are considerably taller than a 20ft chimney, and new trees planted between the road and the site will add a further visual barrier in time. Photographs taken are shown below.
However, a large section of the community remains adamant that no forestry timber should be used in this way, and the questions are wide-ranging. Rob Soutar and Andy Walker of Forest Enterprise attended a meeting of the Community Council energy group, which is trying to find a way towards an overall strategy for Arran’s future power supply, and they were very direct about the problems facing the Forestry. Thirty years ago, growing and exporting timber seemed a viable and straightforward business, but as Andy Walker wryly admitted, ‘We got it wrong.’ But nobody could have foreseen the vast increase in diesel costs that have now made harvesting and exporting timber from the island uneconomic. The Forestry needs a blueprint for the coming years, but there are problems on every side. A future for ‘recreational’ forestry of mixed conifer and broadleaf planting will demand much higher maintenance costs, and there is an obvious attraction in the idea of a local plant that can turn some of it into electrical power.
The question of atmospheric pollution remains a highly impassioned one. It could be pointed out that cottages burning logs in stoves or open fires have long been seen as ‘traditional’ and harmless. In olden days, every child who drew a picture of a house always put a chimney in the centre of its roof, with a scribble of smoke coming out of it. The wood-fuel industry, generally regarded as benevolent, has inherited this fact, but because it has never seemed alarming – and in truth, may not be – there is no disquiet.
New technologies are always partly in the land of the unknown, and can be frightening. Panic is damaging. We have no option but to do the best we can to understand the details of how any proposed plan will work. The current one nudges at the edge of the coming need for all communities to be more self-sufficient in energy production, and the response must be carefully considered. Taboos and terrors are not helpful. We are going to need a rational basis on which to base a tenable future.
