Letter to the Editor: The proposal to erect pylons across the Towy Valley in Carmarthenshire has understandably led to protests from those living in and near the area. Those attending the public consultations on the plan by Bute Energy appear not to have been content with the response they heard to their objections.
The pylons planned are 27 metres high and would clearly adversely affect what is a beautiful part of the country, increasingly appreciated by tourists. Indeed, Carmarthenshire County Council is in the early stages of developing a cycling/walking track along its length, so that people can more easily appreciate its beauty at leisure. This would hardly be helped by the large numbers of pylons planned.
The line of pylons is needed to transmit electricity from a proposed ‘windfarm’ near the Radnor Forest in mid Wales, around 60 miles in total length. Those wind generators would be enormous, around 250 metres high, around 10 times the height of a pylon. They would be visible for a large distance, and times taller than the pylons they feed.
While one can accept the need to reduce emissions from power stations burning fossil fuels, no one can sensibly argue that our reliance on burning oil and gas can be replaced by wind. Wind generated power is erratic and, in the same way, solar power is not a reliable source of large scale power. They have to be backed by reliable sources of electricity. If there were no wind generators planned, there would of course be no need for the pylons.
Current Welsh Government policies would allow a huge number of new wind generators across certain areas of Wales, all highly sensitive to such development. New wind generators inevitably also require new pylons. There are likely to be further protests against both.Since Wales already produces far more electricity than it consumes, any additional electricity is technically not needed to power Welsh homes and businesses. Whatever the Welsh Government thinks it is doing in attempting to make Wales a ‘net zero’ country, it cannot hope to pursue its policies successfully without the support of the people it affects.
I believe the people of Wales deserve to know where we are heading.
Hugh Griffiths, Carmarthen Editor’s note: How do you say ‘not in my backyard’ in Welsh?