Borders community leaders call for joined-up benefit from renewables

Chris Bruce, chair of East Lammermuir Community Council, which is on the edge of East Lothian and the Borders, will be speaking at the meeting, in Jedburgh Town Hall on Saturday, January 17, 2-4pm.

He is calling for a balance to be struck between protest against renewable developments, and the need for communities to see long-term benefits from them.

“There is a balance to be struck between protest and getting the best for the local area,” he said.

‘We repeatedly survey our residents, and at present 78 per cent support the push to move away from fossil fuels.  They don’t want to see their local area ruined, or over-developed.

“However, they do want community or shared ownership of renewables and recognise that some places will see a disproportionate impact as the national grid is upgraded for all of our good.”

Bruce’s comments were echoed by John Anderson, a community council member in Aberdeenshire, who is part of Fordyce, Sandend and District Community Council.

He joined dozens of other community council representatives in the North East at a similar convention last year, which called for a pause in large-scale renewables development.

Mr Anderson said: “People are supportive of trying to get to target zero, but there’s a groundswell of dissatisfaction in how it is being done.”

Where projects are already going ahead, Mr Anderson believed it was ‘absolutely imperative’ that local communities receive financial benefit.

The former subsea engineer added: “With the best will in the world, there are instances where projects have gone ahead, and I believe it is absolutely imperative that local communities receive some financial benefit.”

Mr Anderson pointed to the Nine Community Council Group (9CCG) in South Ayrshire which was formed to ensure locals could, and would, benefit from multi-million-pound community benefit funds generated from local windfarm developments.

“How it currently works is that each individual community council goes to individual windfarm developers, cap in hand,” he explained.

“We really want to inspire fellow community councils in considering the 9CCG model. Now, it is clear that there is appetite for the concept at the very least.”

Stephen McCarron, Chief Operating Officer at 9CCG, said the right sort of relationship between communities and developers could lead to lasting change.

“For rural communities in particular, the seat of local government can feel very far away,” said Mr McCarron.

“But if community councils act in collaboration, it can create solidarity, with local people making local decisions to retain wealth in the impacted area.”

Back in the Borders, Chair of Heriot Community Council John Williams said that wind farms had allowed for transformative projects to take place – but that ambition was limited by the piecemeal nature of community benefit, and limitations to what it could be used for.

Mr Williams, who will also be present at the Borders meeting, said his community had put in place a pioneering community broadband project which is now Borders Online, as well as wraparound care for local schoolchildren.

However, he said that the community “had now run out of things to support”.

He said: “We are not supposed to replace resources which should be provided by the public sector. We are worried about the local school, but we can’t take it over and fund it ourselves.

“With the pylon lines they are talking about huge amounts of money coming into the communities; that could be problematic, because each set of benefits coming through is piecemeal.”

The statements come as Holyrood’s petitions committee responded to a range of calls from communities for better public engagement in big renewable developments, as well as a mandatory shared ownership stake.

Three petitions were discussed on Wednesday, January 14, lodged by groups across the country from Argyll to Aberdeenshire.

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