Challenging a Two-Tier Planning System:
Concerns Over Renewable Energy Projects in Rural Wales
In a closing address at a public meeting I attended in Mid Wales last year, valid concerns were raised about the planning processes for renewable energy projects in rural Wales. Sadly, a year later, nothing has changed, and it is worth repeating those observations.
The speaker highlighted developers' ability to bypass standard planning regulations by asserting that energy production exceeds specific thresholds, which disenfranchises both the public and local authorities.
Distrust was expressed towards some of these companies, noting their contradictory statements during presentations and raising alarm about the lack of independent verification of their claims. Safety issues associated with wind turbines- such as wildlife fatalities, negative impacts on the landscape, tourism, and local residents' quality of life- are mainly overlooked in the planning process. The fairness of a planning system that appears to favour large businesses over individuals was questioned, urging a reconsideration of how such developments are assessed and approved.
Imagine this scenario:
You plan to construct a massive single tower, reaching up to 230 meters tall, in an agricultural field outside the typical planning envelope. It will be composed of fibreglass, steel, and concrete and generate noise throughout the night.
You plan to paint it brilliant white with a flashing red light on top, which will stand out like a sore thumb against the backdrop of a picturesque rural idyll. It will create distracting flickering effects during sunny periods and kill many birds and bats each week.
You submit your planning application fully aware that the same structure had previously been built, exploded, caught fire, toppled over, and scattered debris everywhere. You are deliberately providing the planning authority with misleading information.
Furthermore, constructing your project will cause significant damage, disruption, and inconvenience to the area over an extended period while your materials and machinery are transported to the site.
Local property values could drop by 30%.
How would you honestly expect the planning authority to react?
Sadly, it would appear that an unfair two-tier planning system is operating, where large businesses can enter Wales and exploit the climate change culture of fear to boost their profits at the expense of others. Planning must be equitable and considered a fair and level playing field; otherwise, respect for it, for those who support it, use it, and work within it, is lost.
Thank you, Annie, for highlighting yet another of the incredibly damaging repercussions of having a Government that thinks nothing of relentlessly spouting Net Zero rhetoric and manipulating policy without ever having been able, - or even willing, - to demonstrate that they have carried out their own investigations and basic research into all of the available scientific data on climate and global warming ‘drivers’, and that they have at least a basic understanding of ‘the science’ they are so wedded to.
As our representatives, our politicians have a duty to ensure that they are worthy of our trust and since they are tasked with making decisions on our behalf, they have a duty to act honestly and responsibly on our behalf, - in our best interests, not theirs. But this is not what we are getting!
As far as our Government is concerned, the climate science is ‘settled’. - CO2 has been brought to court, been found guilty, has been sentenced and must be locked up for ever! No right to appeal! End of.
But the truth of the matter is that CO2 was convicted on the basis of only partial (and it has to be said, very shaky), circumstantial evidence, which was submitted at the time of the early ‘trials’ more than 40 years ago.
In the world of scientific research and development, 40 or so years is a very, very long time!
Recently developed scientific research techniques, re-analysis of known data and the comprehensive inclusion of data that has come from what are now universally recognised to be multiple, naturally occurring, often millennium-long cyclical phenomena capable of influencing climate and global temperatures on all of the planets in our solar system, now provides more than enough evidence to show that CO2, - even man-made CO2, - is innocent! It cannot possibly be held wholly responsible for the global warming and climate change that we are experiencing on Earth. This is not conspiracy theory. This is working with science. This is how we learn. This is using our intelligence!
Yet, despite the fact that it can no longer be denied that there are a whole bunch of other much more influential drivers of climate change and global warming being pointed at by ‘the science’, literally no-one within Governments worldwide, is willing to have another look at all of the evidence that is now available.
This has to be wrong, whichever way anybody looks at things, and one has to question ‘Why is everyone behaving like this?’.
Many years ago, some bright spark came up with the idea that the world is not flat.
Another idea was that the Sun did not orbit the Earth, but the earth orbits the Sun….
My goodness, - could any of this possibly be true?…..
These were real revelations all those years ago and some powerful people declared that such ideas were incredibly dangerous, must have originated from heretics who were collaborating with the devil and must be stopped.
People were burned at the stake for making such evil utterances!
But that was such a long time ago. We wouldn’t be doing anything like that these days, would we?.
Of course, the burning of people at the stake for merely opening their mouths in public on what may be perceived by some to be ‘dangerous’ talk may have gone out of fashion, but nowadays, daring to break free from the single proffered narrative on climate change, global warming and Net Zero policy can have very painful consequences for those that are prepared to do it.
For some time now, there has been an oppressive and systematic attempt to demonise and dumb down anyone who dares to disagree with the Net Zero dogma, (irrespective of how much in the way of valid evidence they are able to provide), and a vast range of tactics are being used to shut people up and to try and prevent them from being taken seriously.
We’ve all heard those ridiculous accusations such as ‘You’re a blocker’, or ‘You’re a climate denier’ or ‘You’re a NIMBY’, (often hurled out by people who have no idea how stupid and utterly meaningless such insults are), but usually the insults are hurled out in order to end further discussion on the subject of Net Zero.
And yet, it is the very same people who are guilty of hurling out the insults, that are themselves ‘deniers’ and ‘blockers’, because they refuse, point blank, to accept that their ‘settled climate change science’ needs to go through a re-evaluation!
And it gets worse.
Over the last few decades, there have been a considerable number of brave, highly knowledgeable, formerly highly-respected professional people who have lost their careers and reputations for daring to speak out against the Net Zero narrative.
Words such as ‘Misinformation’ and ‘Conspiracy theory’ are often used and bandied about by those who wish to prevent information that doesn’t fit the ‘accepted’ narrative from entering the public domain.
Have we slipped through some sort of time-travel black hole back into the dark ages?
It certainly appears that way to me!
So, what exactly is it that the Net Zero zealots are so afraid of, that they will not entertain any thoughts of having a thorough look at all of ‘the science’ that is now available?
What is so wrong with having well-informed, honest, straightforward debate?
I’ll let you think about those little conundrums for a moment or two…...
Getting back to our Welsh Government.
In their infinite wisdom, they have gone even further down the CO2 rabbit hole by declaring a ‘climate emergency’ and have gone to a great deal of effort to manipulate planning policy in order to force through their Net Zero agenda and everything that it entails, without ever having first gained approval from the population it is meant to be serving via any properly conducted democratic process.
There is now, most definitely, an unfair two-tier planning system operating here in Wales and it has been created deliberately by the Welsh Government in order to achieve their self-proclaimed ‘saving the planet’ Net Zero targets and they have jumped whole-heartedly into bed with the renewables industry sector to do so.
All onshore 'large-scale' wind and solar projects have been deliberately reclassified in order to have the decision making process taken away from Local Authority planning departments, thereby removing any opportunity for those people who are likely to be detrimentally affected by such schemes to have their concerns properly dealt with, let alone listened to.
Currently, the Welsh Government is utilising the DNS (Development of National Significance) planning process to push through the granting of these renewables schemes, (so long as they’re not located slap-bang in the middle of a National Park), safe in the knowledge that PEDW (Planning and Environmental Decisions Wales) Inspectors have been tasked with prioritising the meeting of Net Zero targets over pretty much everything else, including going against the advice of some of their own experts if needs be. The Inspectors and the Ministers tasked with making the final decision to approve, have now learnt how to put their reports together in such a way as to use all of the ‘climate emergency’, Net Zero targets/dates etc. etc. arguments that they can muster, so they will be able to demonstrate in the future, - should anyone try and challenge their decisions, - that they have stuck like superglue to all of the correct processes, policies and tick box exercises that were required of them.
They now have all of their ducks in a row and will be pushing out the planning approvals like sausages from now on. And we, the Welsh public, can do nothing to stop them!
‘Government’ behaviour in this respect has been worse than deplorable.
They have set up a win-win scenario for all of the ‘parties’ who are ‘in’ on the Net Zero deal.
And it’s a lose-lose scenario for anyone or anything that gets in the way.
We’ve been sold down the river by our politicians folks!
Thank you Annie for writing this excellent and important piece. I hope you don't mind if I repost it on my blog?