Protesters against plans for 19 wind turbines each more than 400ft high on "West Glamorgan's last wilderness" have joined a new European-wide campaign against wind energy schemes. Opponents of proposals by npower renewables (sponsors of The Ospreys rugby team) for the wind turbines on common land on hills at Mynydd y Gwair north of Swansea say the project will ruin the upland area which has remained unchanged for hundreds of years. Save our Common Environment (Socme), which is fighting the plans, has joined the European Platform against Windfarms representing growing disenchantment with the schemes.

It will cost every household in the UK at least £2,000 to comply with the new European Union target of producing 15 per cent of all energy from renewable sources by 2020, according to a report commissioned by the government. ...According to energy consultancy Pöyry, the bill for the UK to meet the target would be at least €5bn a year for more than a decade, compared with just over €3bn a year for France and Germany, and well under €500m for most other countries.

Nato has begun an investigation into British findings that wind farms make overflying planes invisible to radar as military chiefs fear a security threat from the rapid spread of the turbines. The US has been attending tests by Britain's Air Warfare Centre after it made the surprise discovery that the energy plants create blind spots in air defences. Renewable energy campaigners have been stung by a spate of last-minute objections from the Ministry of Defence to proposed new wind farms in northeast England and the Scottish Borders. Nato's alarm about this potential Achilles' heel against airborne terrorists or invaders is disclosed in evidence, seen by The Times, for a planning inquiry.

Tom Murley, head of UK private equity group HgCapital's renewable energy team, has warned clean energy stocks could be about to fall. At a conference held by Financial News last week, he said: "We are at the peak of inflated expectations." ...Murley, who heads the largest team of renewable energy specialists in the UK private equity market, said long-term prospects for quality clean energy companies are bright. But he compared the soaring price of clean energy stocks with the technology bull market of the late 1990s and argued innovation leads to overexuberance in stock markets. This is followed by disillusionment as competing products develop and investors realize profits will disappoint. A steady rise out of the trough follows as quality companies start to make headway.

...more than 100 reporters swarmed to the exchange for a lunch hosted by Iberdrola's chairman, Ignacio Galan, to present the company's strategic plan for the next three years and its quarterly results - the first following the acquisition of Scottish Power earlier in the year. ...During his presentation, Galan noted that because the interest in renewable energy has taken off, demand for turbines is outstripping supply. He said that the link with Gamesa will help ensure Iberdrola has access to the turbines it needs and wants. Gamesa represents 63% of the supply contracts Iberdrola has. ...Moulder at CreditSights said that his concern is that "senior management at Iberdrola do not understand the regulatory regime in the UK. There are certainly managers within the UK who will be experts on regulation, but we get the impression that Spanish managers believe they can lobby politicians to change regulation in other countries (rather like they do in Spain) and if they try this in the US or in the UK they will be in for a shock." Wolfden at Uswitch also has reservations and said the integration between the two companies is still very much "ongoing".He questioned whether the Spaniards have "fully understood the UK market or appreciate quite how competitive it is". He also said that consumers will increasingly demand more services and better service for their money.

The EU Commission remains confident that Britain will deliver on its commitments to increase the use of renewable energy sources, despite doubts expressed in London, a Brussels spokesman said Monday. British officials have told government ministers that the country has no chance of meeting its commitments under European Union plans to raise the proportion of energy made from renewable sources by 2020, a British newspaper reported.

Concern about dangers to Britain's biggest birds of prey from windfarms came as 15 White-tailed Eagle chicks were flown to Scotland for a new comeback scheme. The youngsters, when able to fly, will be released in about two months in the first phase of a new project to restore this species to eastern Scotland where it was wiped out by human persecution almost 200 years ago. Now they [up to 80 more to be released over the next four years] and the new population in the Hebridean islands following a similar, post-1970s re-introduction project will face a new hazard - if they happen to move into areas well stocked with wind turbines.

The vast majority of commercial practices defined as unfair under the general prohibition will fall into two categories; they will be "misleading" and/or "aggressive". An important objective of the Directive is to create greater legal certainty, so the ways in which a commercial practice can stray into this territory is set out in detail. A misleading commercial practice will contain false information (i.e. be untruthful) or will in some way deceive, or be likely to deceive, the average consumer into taking a transactional decision that he would not otherwise have made. An aggressive commercial practice achieves much the same outcome but by means of harassment, coercion (including physical force) or undue influence so as to significantly impair (or be likely to impair) the average consumer's freedom of choice or conduct.

“There's legitimate debate about a couple of segments,” says Keith Raab, boss of Cleantech Venture Network. In some instances, valuations accorded to firms with no profits—and little chance of making any soon—were reminiscent of the excesses of the dotcom bubble. As Douglas Lloyd, of Venture Business Research, puts it, “There's too much money chasing too few opportunities. How is it possible that this many solar companies are going to succeed? They're not.”

The argument between price and reliability continues because dwindling European gas reserves are creating new pressures. In Britain, wind power is fashionable but very expensive and causes network problems. Scotland, being windy, is a good place for wind turbines, but the power is needed in southern England and National Grid worries about the cost of transmission. How much should it build? Because wind is intermittent, each turbine is only 30 per cent efficient, but transmission lines must be able to cope with maximum output....... 100 per cent reliable, clean energy. It’s not feasible and, faced with an expensive dilemma, the British Government has exposed its intellectual failure by threatening consumers with tax increases. Europe has opted, more or less, for market-based solutions that produce cheap rather than secure energy, but suppliers of fuel, such as Gazprom, are becoming more monopolistic. A collision between the two is not far away. Mr Piebalgs needs to get thinking.

The German distributor E.ON admitted it caused the blackouts, by switching off a power cable across the River Ems to allow a cruise ship to pass. This meant areas to the west were left with a power deficit, while cables in the east were overloaded. Supplies cut out in Germany, France, Belgium, Spain, Portugal, Croatia and Italy. The EU's Energy Commissioner Andris Piebalgs has called for the European Transmission System Operators (ETSO) to identify the problem urgently and ensure that such a blackout does not happen again.

The peat landslip in 2003 at Derrybrien saw a bog slide almost two miles down a hillside in County Galway - polluting waterways, killing 50,000 fish and engulfing a farmhouse.

Needless to say not everyone is impressed with the UK’s latest energy review.

IRELAND could soon be importing green energy from Scotland in an ambitious revenue-raising scheme.

"The original battle took two hours and thousands of people died. The second battle took two years and no blood was spilt. And it was all the better because the French and the British worked together to achieve this victory."

The village’s ambition to become a tourist centre was given a boost last month when the French state electricity generator, Eléctricité de France (EDF), withdrew a planning application to place four 459ft (140m) wind turbines half a mile from the battlefield. The plan had been fought by campaigners on both sides of the Channel, including the actor, Robert Hardy, who said that it would desecrate the battlefield.

THE UK took its fight for a liberal energy market to Europe yesterday as Malcolm Wicks, the Energy Minister, chided his European colleagues for allowing vested interests to keep markets closed.

The RSPB has released a series of images which show the scale of plans for a huge wind farm planned for the Hebridean island of Lewis.

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.