BBC Weather World’s Advert For Wind Power

By Paul Homewood

 

h/t stewgreen

 

 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b0bw9ckk/weather-world-21122018

 

You would be entitled to think that the BBC’s Weather World programme might concern itself with weather. But this is the BBC we are talking about !

In this special Christmas edition, they have decided to start the programme with a slavishly fawning segment on the Whitelee Wind Farm near Glasgow.

(I probably don’t need to add that the introduction to the other items on the programme talks about “floods that rage with almost unbelievable force”, “cyclones that transform a coastal paradise into piles of rubble” and “ amid warnings of climate catastrophe to come, wildfires that reach new scales of size and devastation”. Later on they even show David Attenborough’s preposterous “We’re all going to die” speech at Katowice)

The Whitelee piece begins with a mention of “cleaner, greener renewable power”, so we are left without any doubt about the lack of objectivity that will follow.

When this segment is filmed, it is a windy day, allowing Whitelee’s site manager to brag that it was generating enough to supply 300,000 homes. It did not occur to the presenters to ask him what these 300,000 homes are supposed to do when it is not such a windy day.

 

There are many other things that the BBC omitted too.

Colin Megson takes up the story on the Scotland Against Spin Facebook page:

Dear BBC News 24 Editor,

Tonight at 9:30 pm, you will be presenting Weather World from Whitelee Windfarm, proclaiming a performance of supplying electricity to 300,000 homes.

To leave viewers with this impression will be a travesty of news reality, which may be unparalleled in BBC peace-time broadcasting.

Since 2010, Whitelee has been paid a total of £96 million to shut down – not generate electricity.

Throughout 2017 and continuing into 2018, Whitelee has only generated enough electricity to power, on average, 166,000 homes; that’s a reduction of 45% on the figure you will state as fact.

Without question, the BBC wholeheartedly support technologies to reduce greenhouse gas emissions across all platforms. You would probably concur with the reduction of GHGs being ‘the name of the game’.

Would you please take into account the following factors regarding the construction, of Whitelee Windfarm:

850,000 m³ of ancient [6,000 to 9,000 years old] blanket peat bog were excavated and spread about, releasing enormous quantities of methane gas.

Methane has 30X the potency of CO2 as a damaging GHG.

2,250,000 [9 km²] non-native conifers were removed.

3 km² of spruce trees were removed.

40,000 m³ of concrete was needed.

2,500,000 tonne of stone was quarried.

Whitelee has a lifespan of 25 years at the most. Being paid to shut down and operating as it does, it would not be unreasonable to say that Whitelee Windfarm would not pay back its carbon-dept if it operated for 100 years.

This completely negates its raison d’être – cutting GHG emissions. It makes a mockery of ‘green investment’. It may well make a mockery of your presentation too, if you do not make these facts known to your followers.

Kind regards,

https://www.facebook.com/groups/281302381898831/permalink/2441170392578675/

 

And as Colin’s own website, Idiocy of Renewables shows, the output from Whitelee is extremely erratic:

https://idiocyofrenewables.blogspot.com/2018/02/the-abomination-that-is-whitelee.html 

 

Whitelee apparently extends over about 10 miles. If this sort of environmental destruction of wild areas occurred for any other purpose, there would rightfully be loud objections, not least from the BBC itself.

As well as the issues raised by Colin, I would also point out that the BBC forgot to mention how much subsidies are paid to Whitelee.

For every unit of electricity generated, they receive Renewable Energy Certificates (ROCs) worth £47.22/MWh, on top of the market value of the power itself. According to their website, Whitelee produces 1.27 TWh a year on average, meaning that subsidies amount to £60m each year. Not a bad return for a scheme that cost £300m to build.

And who benefits?

Whitelee is ultimately owned by Iberdrola, the Spanish energy company, whilst Siemens and Alstom supplied the turbines. In return, the UK is stuck with high electricity prices and environmental devastation.

 

Cheapest form of energy?

The Whitelee segment finishes with two utterly fake claims:

1) The girlie presenter, in conversation with Mark Gailey of Scottish Power Renewables, the owner of Whitelee, baldly states:

“Already about 30% of the UK’s power is produced by wind energy”

The real figure is 15%.

Gailey then tells us that “onshore wind is the cheapest form of energy, of course”, without any hint of a challenge from girlie.

 

Another complaint to the BBC? Well, it is Christmas!