Scottish Natural Heritage yesterday confirmed its objection to a huge wind farm planned for Lewis. SNH board members reiterated their previous view that land covered by special protection area status might be harmed by the development. They also said there was insufficient information to determine the potential impact on birds. Last week, Comhairle nan Eilean Siar (Western Isles Council) voted 18-8 in favour of the plan by Lewis Wind Power, subject to 50 conditions, including the removal of five of the proposed 181 turbines. Because of the scale of the 651-megawatt project, a final decision rests with the Scottish Executive. Meanwhile, SNH has withdrawn its objection to a proposed wind farm at Edinbane on Skye. It follows a public consultation by Highland Council on the latest submission from the developer AMEC, which included an appraisal of the likely effect on golden eagles.

Anti windfarm campaigners on Skye last night threatened legal action in a bid to ensure a long-opposed development on the island would never happen. Opponents of Amec’s Edinbane proposal stated their intent shortly after Scottish Natural Heritage (SNH) withdrew its objection to a reduced 18-turbine project. That followed consideration of a fresh consultants’ estimate, commissioned by the developers, of the likely impact on golden eagles within the protected area surrounding the site.

The Uk Government could face a multimillion-pound fine if Scottish ministers allow plans for a massive windfarm on the Western Isles to go ahead, the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds warned yesterday. It believes the Lewis Wind Power application for 181 turbines was made without a proper environmental impact assessment. That, it says, would contravene the European Habitats Directive.

Opponents of a huge wind farm planned for the Western Isles have vowed to continue to fight the development after it was approved by councillors. Western Isles Council voted 18 to eight on Thursday in favour of the plan by Lewis Wind Power, subject to 50 conditions, including the removal of five of the 181 turbines earmarked for an area of moorland in north Lewis. Because of the scale of the 651-megawatt project, a final decision rests with the Scottish Executive, although it is unlikely to come before the Scottish elections. RSPB Scotland and some islanders are against the wind farm, and next week the board of Scottish Natural Heritage is expected to reiterate its objection. Anne McCall, RSPB Scotland’s head of planning and development, said: “We have not given up hope, quite the contrary.” RSPB has said the wind farm will have a “devastating impact” on a 6,000-hectare area.

A rare bird will have almost no chance of being struck by the moving blades of proposed wind turbines, according to an expert. The issue of bird collisions with turbines was raised on day 19 of the Humberhead Levels Windfarm inquiry.Stewart Lowther, of Hyder Consulting, was cross-examined about the risk to the birds. In July 2005, English Nature raised concerns there may be a significant effect from the two proposed windfarms in Thorne and Keadby Grange on the nightjar population.

With the envisaged escalation of windfarm developments in the North Sea, the North Sea Regional Advisory Council (NSRAC)has taken the first steps towards producing a set of minimum standards for how the fishing sector and the offshore windfarm industry should consult with each other.But it emerged today that there is already a feeling that fishermen are being consulted too late in the planning process.

The debate intensified yesterday as the deadline passed for responses to the proposal to build 181 wind turbines on the island of Lewis. Comhairle nan Eilean Siar (Western Isles Council) will almost certainly recommend approval but it will be up to ministers to take the final decision and they will not do so until after the Scottish parliamentary elections in May.

Bats and garden birds are being injured and killed in collisions with domestic wind turbines attached to people’s homes, an environmentalist has warned. John Stoneman, of Cambridgeshire Environmental and Wildlife Protection (CEWP) Welney, has launched a campaign to highlight the dangers of the supposed energy saving turbines, which he claims in fact have very little benefit. Mr Stoneman said the garden was the only sanctuary and refuge available for many diminishing species and he was urging manufacturers of mini turbines to carry out environmental-impact studies. He said: “Bats are already a heavily protected species but they are being put in danger by domestic turbines.

The row over plans to build the world’s biggest onshore wind farm on Lewis intensified yesterday as a leading wildlife group claimed the job boost predictions made by the developer were “misleading and hugely optimistic”. The accusations were levelled against the Lewis Wind Power (LWP) scheme by RSPB Scotland, which has been campaigning to stop the massive renewable energy scheme from going ahead.

A shocked busload of nuclear workers witnessed the death of a buzzard after it flew into one of the wind turbines at Forss. The demise of the adult buzzard was seen on Wednesday by a group of workers travelling between New Park business park at Forss and the neighbouring site at Dounreay at lunchtime on Wednesday. The financial administrator, Terry Luckock, reported the death to the RSPB. She said: “It was a real shame to see such a beautiful bird killed in this way. It did not stand a chance given that it collided with a moving, nine-tonne blade.” Ms Luckock, 41, from Halkirk, does not believe it was an isolated occurrence.

THE number of golden eagles in Scotland has been kept down by new developments that have encroached on their territories. Forestry plantations have had a much bigger effect on Scotland's iconic bird of prey than previously thought, reducing its food supply by covering open ground and lowering its ability to produce offspring, researchers say. They now warn that similar effects can be expected from new wind farms if they are allowed to proceed in golden eagle ranges.

The RSPB is objecting to a controversial plan to build the West’s biggest wind farm next to the Bristol Channel, we can reveal. Experts from the bird charity are unhappy with the proposal for nine 110m (361ft) turbines at West Hinkley, beside Hinkley Point nuclear power station. They say more work should be done on the wind farm’s possible impact on nearby birds in the Severn estuary, especially shelduck, ringed plover and curlews.

Controversial plans to erect giant wind turbines in West Somerset have suffered a dramatic setback after the influential Royal Society for the protection of birds has come out against the scheme at Hinkley Point. It’s the first time the influential organisation has objected to a proposed wind farm in the South West. Richard Archer, conservation officer for the RSPB in Somerset, told the County Gazette: “This is not a decision we have taken lightly, as we are generally in support of schemes to reduce our carbon footprint and combat global warming.”

The big wind farm debate rumbled on this week as the RSPB again signalled its opposition to the nine-turbine plan for West Hinkley. The society stood against Your Energy’s proposals when they were first submitted in 2004. Giant turbines, RSPB representatives say, would have a detrimental effect on the birds living around the site.

A HOTEL owner is being driven batty by planning delays for a wind turbine that could bring green power to his business. Stuart McGlynn, who owns the Norwood Hotel, Whalley Road, Accrington, hopes to place a small turbine on the side of his detached house, behind the hotel. But the possibility that a bat population may be roosting nearby has put a temporary halt to the plans until a wildlife survey is carried out.

The company behind controversial plans to site the world’s largest onshore wind farm in the Western Isles last night strongly denied that pressing ahead with the project would breach European rules on protecting wildlife. Lewis Wind Power (LWP), which is jointly owned by Amec and British Energy, was reacting to claims that the European Commission could rule that the proposal broke its conservation laws as other sites across Scotland had not been considered for the massive project. Wildlife campaigners yesterday argued that European directives, which are binding on member states, require developers of wind farms to look at options across the country, not just in the Western Isles. The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB) in Scotland said that the plan to build 181 turbines in Lewis was covered by these rules and, therefore, that the Scottish Executive, which will have the final say, should not give it the go-ahead.

Plans to build the world’s biggest onshore wind farm on the Western Isles could be thwarted by European officials, who believe they breach laws protecting sensitive wildlife habitats. The European commission believes that proposals to build more than 180 turbines on Lewis are flawed, because developers have failed to assess other less sensitive sites across Scotland. The Lewis turbines, each more than 460ft high, would stretch for more than 25 miles through peatland protected under European Union conservation laws. The area is home to eight species of Europe’s most endangered birds, including golden eagles, red-throated divers and merlin.

The long-running battle between country folk and government over windfarms took a new twist today as a war broke out between the Scottish Executive and a conservation body which has called for more “green” electricity generation. The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds and its Scottish branch have in the past angered many rural communities for being outspoken supporters of wind farms - which mainly serve towns and cities but are always located in the countryside. But the Scottish RSPB today issued an outspoken protest about re-designed plans to build the UK’s largest windfarm on the Isle of Lewis, in the Western Isles, which it says is “one of Scotland’s most sensitive and important sites for wildlife.”

Save the planet or preserve the planet? It is this dilemma which has caused so much consternation among environmental groups. For many green groups, wind farms are an embodiment of a necessary evil. We must reduce our dependence on dirty fossil fuels, and wind energy is a clean alternative – seen by many as preferable to nuclear power, with its questionable safety reputation and problems with waste disposal. However, there is no doubting that some of the best sites for wind farms – windswept moorland, remote rural areas – are also some of the most ecological fragile. Here wildlife, including some of Scotland’s most threatened species, can have a tentative hold on life. Place a wind farm in its midst and the environmental balance could be affected.

Plans for a new £4 million community wind farm on the Shetland island of Yell have been stalled because three pairs of nesting birds abandoned their eggs before they hatched. The North Yell Development Council (NYDC) had hoped to start erecting five 850KW Vesta turbines between the villages of Cullivoe and Gutcher next year.