A whistleblower report by the Sunday Mail in Scotland revealed on Sunday that at least 71 giant wind turbines utilized by Scottish Power were actually hooked up to diesel generators to keep power flowing. The company claimed it utilized the fossil-fuel powered generators in December when cold weather caused the turbines to malfunction, which reduced the energy supplied by the turbines.
Scottish Power claims that “all our domestic green tariffs are backed by 100% green electricity, made by our windfarms right here in the UK.”
But, apparently, not when it gets really cold, when that energy is needed most.
“During December 60 turbines at Arecleoch and 11 at Glenn App were de-energised due to a cabling fault originating at Mark Hill wind farm. In order to get these turbines re-energised diesel generators were running for upwards of six hours a day,” the anonymous whistleblower explained.
Frozen wind turbines were, reportedly, one of the reasons for electricity failing during the “Texas Freeze” of 2021. Nearly 250 people died in that event.
“The Scottish Government wants to make our country attractive to foreign investors as 40 per cent of the wind that blows across Europe blows across Scotland. However, that should not mean we put up with our waterways and nature being polluted with carbon from diesel generators and hydraulic oil,” the whistleblower told the Sunday Mail. “People should be aware that, while their energy costs continue to rise, our wind farms are not operating as efficiently as they could be due to corporate greed.”
Of course, the reason so-called renewable energies such as wind power are desired by climate hysterics is that they don’t use fossil fuels such as diesel.
The whistleblower also detailed other technical issues and environmental problems associated with Scotland’s largest wind project.
“Turbines are regularly offline due to faults where they are taking energy from the grid rather than producing it, and also left operating on half power for long periods due to parts which haven’t been replaced,” the whistleblower reported.
As far as environmental problems: “Dirty hydraulic oil is also regularly being sprayed out across the Scottish countryside due to cracks in mechanisms. Safety standards have not improved since a worker was killed in 2017 at Kilgallioch wind farm.”
Scottish Power confirmed at least part of the whistleblower’s accusations when a spokesman for the company admitted that diesel generators were used for a “short period of time” because of an “external fault on the GB network,” which prevented three wind farms from supplying power during a December cold stretch.
“Due to an external fault on the network, the three wind farms were unable to operate,” the spokesman said. “During the extreme cold in December, in line with manufacturer’s recommendations, the turbines’ internal temperature were returned to safe levels by six diesel generators for a short period of time.”
Of course, the revelation caused a political backlash with the minority Labour Party accusing the SNPs and the Green Party, who run a fragile coalition government in the nation, of dishonesty in their estimation of Scotland’s wind-power potential.
“The SNP and Greens have proven time and time again they cannot be trusted on environmental issues,” said Labour member of parliament Colin Smyth. “They laud Scotland’s potential for renewables yet don’t appear to ensure those already in existence are properly run. This isn’t the first problem raised — and there is concern at a lack of openness when problems arise.”
“Whatever the reasons, having to use diesel generators to deice faulty turbines is environmental madness. This level of dishonesty cuts to the very core of the SNP and Green Government where their rhetoric on net zero is very different from the reality,” Smyth concluded.
There is a certain irony in the fact that a technology in use mainly to counter the effects of global warming tends to fail during times of extreme cold.
The revelation that diesel power must be used to keep the wind farms operating in Scotland is another example of how so-called renewable energy sources are not the green panacea that climate hysterics claim they are. Whether it’s wind projects killing whales off the coast of New Jersey or spraying hydraulic oil on the Scottish countryside, or solar projects causing environmental headaches on Guam, the renewables currently being forced on the world are not without their environmental impacts.
And even worse, they do not provide a dependable, reliable source of energy.
