Philip Bowman, the new chief executive of ScottishPower, yesterday attacked the planning constraints that slow the growth of renewable energy in the UK and he urged the government to stump up greater investment for renewable technology.

The UK is not as windy as the British government thought. The country’s first generation of wind farms are delivering less power than predicted, according to an analysis of official data on their output. The finding dents government hopes that wind turbines could generate up to a fifth of the UK’s energy by 2020.

In his first major speech on climate change David Cameron will outline Conservative plans to replace Labour's Climate Change Levy with a new, more effective and better targeted Carbon Levy.

Tories backed its nuclear message with a call for on-shore wind farm projects to be frozen.

Gordon Brown signalled a raft of measures to tackle climate change, which made his 2006 Budget by far the greenest of the 10 he has presented. To many environmentalists, it appeared he was - at last - taking the issue of global warming really seriously.

Nuclear power, the totemic issue inspiring fear and loathing in equal measure among many Labour MPs and environmental campaigners, was, the Prime Minister declared this week, back on the agenda "with a vengeance".

The North Sea fillip comes as the pace of energy developments continues to gather momentum in the run-up to the Government's announcement on its new energy policy. The Prime Minister has signed a pact with President Jacques Chirac to pave the way for French co-operation on a new nuclear power programme. The Government has also given the clearance for a series of renewable energy projects including clean coal. New surveys point to an acceleration in job creation in the sector.

ALL Scotland's electricity needs could be met from renewable energy sources by 2050 under a bold vision for a greener future unveiled yesterday by Nicol Stephen, the deputy first minister. In an hugely ambitious pledge, the leader of the Scottish Liberal Democrats vowed to go further than the Executive's existing commitment to meet 40 per cent of the country's electricity requirements through renewable sources by 2020.

... wind energy farms are not a simple panacea for the country's energy problems. Last week the Beatrice turbines were being serviced but, if they had been operational, they would not have been turning. The North Sea's winds were virtually non-existent, meaning no power would have been generated. Opponents say such variability of output is a drawback of wind energy. But O'Brien insisted: 'If we can build big turbines far away from the shore, they will cause minimum upset and disruption. This is their future and that is why the Beatrice project is so important.'

The increase, which would see the price achieved for a kilowatt hour of power output rise from 6.2c to 10c, is needed to offset higher capital and financing costs, the Irish Wind Energy Association (IWEA) chief executive Dr Michael Walsh said. ..."A price level of 10c for on-shore wind is necessary to reflect market conditions, including increasing capital and financing costs for projects, and critical in underpinning private sector investment of €6bn needed to deliver our national targets," he said.

"There is a huge potential for small hydro energy schemes across Scotland as part of a wider process of decentralisation of energy production. Locally produced hydro power for local needs will prove to be a valuable resource" - FRIENDS OF THE EARTH, SCOTLAND

SOME people call them windfarms, others describe them as ‘power stations in inappropriate locations', but all agree that one alternative energy source is an issue dividing communities in Northumberland. Alastair Gilmour reports in the first of five features this week looking at the controversial windfarm issue.

In a Question to the Environment Minister in the National Assembly, Elin Jones, Assembly Member for Ceredigion has challenged Carwyn Jones to give priority to the use of Forestry Commission land for windfarm developments.

“With renewable energy sources several decades away from providing more than a tiny minority of our energy needs, we urgently need government policy to promote clean coal to save thousands of jobs and avoid blackouts and soaring utility bills over the next five years.”

But Miliband's bubble was burst on Tuesday morning, when an announcement issued from Aarhus on the east coast of Denmark reached his desk. Danish wind energy giant Vestas was about to deal a hefty blow to his vision of building thousands of jobs and new businesses around the "low carbon" economy. Vestas chief executive Ditlev Engel revealed the company was axing 625 jobs in Britain and planned to close its manufacturing plant on the Isle of Wight.

Campaigners against wind farms have hit out at claims councils should be forced to hand over land for turbines. It comes after Hull East MP John Prescott said too many wind turbine planning applications are blocked and urged ministers to take on "nimbys", which stands for "not in my backyard". The former deputy prime minister wants to force councils to earmark sites for wind farms, as part of a strategy to override residents' objections to the developments.

THE group behind a second huge wind farm planned for the sea off Walney says its construction will create 200 jobs. The latest proposal for 139 turbines, many of them taller than Blackpool Tower, means that within a few years there will be more than 300 turbines off the Barrow coast. The company behind the plan has promised to give as much work as it can to local contractors. On Wednesday the government gave the go-ahead for the first large wind farm off Walney planned by Danish energy group Dong. It is to develop a 75 square kilometre Walney Wind Farm with up to 152 giant turbines operating 14 miles off Walney.

[ENERGY Minister Malcolm] Wicks said the Government did not want to force through turbines where there was a good reason to refuse permission. He said: "I'm a great fan of wind energy, but I always thought if it is not appropriate in a particular location, the answer should be no. And those answers sometimes come from the local authority and if they are very large, those decisions come through my department. I actually said no to one near the Lake District, but yes to another large one. "The thing to remember is we should not be so gung-ho about any technology that we start to create a backlash in terms of public opinion.

GREEN lobby groups that oppose nuclear energy were accused of "fundamentalism" yesterday as the Government announced a review of whether to build a new generation of nuclear power stations.

Members of a group campaigning against a windfarm are urging people to sign a petition calling on Tony Blair to withdraw subsidies for onshore turbine developments in “valued landscapes”. Members of Den Brook Valley Action Group (DBVAG), which has been fighting plans to build nine 394ft tall wind turbines in the valley between North Tawton and Bow, are awaiting the outcome of a public inquiry into the plan, which was held in November. In the meantime, the group is calling on people to sign an online petition set up by anti-windfarm campaigner Bill Short, from the North of England.