Will the Thousands of Ecologists Put Out of Work by Labour’s Planning Reforms Finally Turn on Bird-Massacring Renewables?
The FT is reporting that the Government’s planning system reforms are putting thousands of jobs at risk. But for once, this may not be the bad news that it seems. “The planning and infrastructure bill,” explains the paper, “is intended to ‘get Britain building’ and remove obstructive regulation.” One of the obstructions to construction in Britain has been the requirement that proposed development sites are not home to endangered species, and that developers have minimised the potential ecological impact. And this has even affected so-called ‘green’ developments, including wind and solar farms. The green agenda had begun to eat itself, so something had to give. And, having destroyed much of Britain’s industries and businesses, the green agenda has come for the very ecologists who drove it.
In the 1990s, as Shire Tories broke bread with the Greta Thunbergs of the time – the anti-bypass protesters – it was ultimately a rare species of tiny snail that proved to be the most effective obstruction. Since then, as all Westminster parties have, in lockstep, sought to expand environmental bureaucracies to remake Britain in Gaia’s image, there has been ever less political appetite for new roads, factories and homes, despite a growing population. This endless bureaucratisation of nature seemed to reach a peak under the previous government, which agreed, among other things, that 30% of the UK’s land area should be “protected for nature” by 2030 – a target agreed by the 2022 UN biodiversity summit.
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Only one native species in the UK is seriously threatened, and it has two legs and no wings
And pale skin.
Definitely.
Habitat of prolific Green Parasites under threat, as Green Revolution eats own offspring.
Maybe they’ll start advocating for Green Coal instead. Bring it on.
Daily Sceptic putting ecology under the microscope just over a year ago…
https://staging.dailysceptic.org/2024/01/08/can-we-trust-the-science-of-ecology/
…As the final commenter explains, “97% of climate and ecological scientists agree they’d be out of a job if there was no climate or ecological crisis.”
It would be left to the remaining 3% to create a crisis. Daunting task.
Pests like Packham and Vince driven to extinction. Someone please pass the Roundup.
Bring back sodium chlorate, it killed everything.
Napalm for the two arch green twerps.
Mmmm….a deep intake of breath in the morning.
The environmental and ecological damage of wind and solar generation is absolutely incredible.
The amount of raw materials and rare earths that have to be dug up and processed per unit of energy generated over the lifespan of the installation are absolutely insane.
True environmentalists should be clamouring for hydrocarbons and nuclear.
Let’s just get this straight…
…To build the shoeboxes to accommodate the migrants, and to blight Britain with more bird mincers and solar fryers to intermittently power the shoeboxes by intermittent breezes and intermittent sunbeams, Green Labour is doing away with the planning restrictions that keep green ecologists in a job.
All to pander to Green Greens who got under 5% of the national vote at the last General Election. Look no further than Green Brighton, for the Green Paradise brought to voters blessed with a Green Green and Green Labour council.
Meanwhile under no circumstance will Green Hampstead where Green Labour luvvies live become a 15-Minute Ghetto.
That’s Green Spiv Politics for you. Go figure electorate green behind the ears.
Ben should also have included reference to Biodiversity Net Gain obligations. A planning consultant I know has told me of a basic grass field for which over half the land would have to be undeveloped and seeded with wild flowers and plants which do not grow as native species on the site. That halves the number of dwellings. Alternatively, and more likely, the developer can pay tens of thousands of pounds to have similar land set aside for each dwelling – land formerly used to grow food.
Any woods or grassland nearby owned by the same person do not count as a structured management agreement has to be entered into and approved by the authorities – ie, another big business scam. The effect on development and on the cost of housing is startling.
“A three-megawatt wind turbine can contain up to 4.7 tons of copper with 53% of that demand coming from the cable and wiring, 24% from the turbine/power generation components, 4% from transformers, and 19% from turbine transformers.”
“Blades, typically 170 feet long, most end up being thrown away, a waste total that will reach a cumulative mass of 2.2 million metric tons by 2050”
“A land-based turbine tower, they level the ground and lay down a concrete foundation, which can use as much as 600-1000 tons of concrete and 165 tons of steel”
“insect remains that stick to the leading edges of blades during low-wind periods can halve power generation during high-wind periods”
All for very little gain!
Wow.
All that copper– must be a target for freelance scrap metal hunters.
Very little gain except… the very generous subsidies they are *really* farming
True, although you seriously underestimate the amount of concrete in turbine foundations.
The “rule of thumb” foundation is a cube 10x10x10 metres, so a thousand cubic metres. At around 2.5 tons per cubic meter, that is 2,500 tonnes of concrete.
Good grief! 😮
Good piece by Ben Pile. But the Desmoulin Whorl Snail is very far from the most significant critter whose only use to to prevent almost any development. The most obvious critter in this respect is probably the Great Crested Newt. Under EU legislation these newts are in the top grade of ‘endangerment’ and allegedly spotting one is usually sufficient to prevent development, or if sufficiently important, to delay development until ‘newt fences’ have been erected and those few ‘environmentalists’ who hold a licence to handle them have relocated them inside their ‘new habitat’. As a Chartered Civil Engineer, I was well aware of the problem. I had joined the Confederation of British Industry’s Minerals Group in 2007 and eventually became Vice Chair of the Group until I retired in 2012. I’m proud to say I represented the Coal Industry. The rest of the CBI group included representatives of many quarrying, brick making, hard rock cutting and othe minerals interests. Almost all had had newt problems when wanting to extend operations or applying for new sites. Looking at my weekly copy of the ‘New Civil Engineer’ showed how many development sites were delayed, nation wide. After much discussion, a meeting with… Read more »
The whole point of decarbonisation was, from the start, to deindustrialise, reduce prosperity (whatever our elected reps may say) and reduce populations. This has been planned since the 1960s and 70s. When there is enough chaos, the globalists (UN, TriComm, central banks, WEF, EU COmmission et al) will tell us we need a Global Government. They don’t care at all about wilderness, birds, bads and insects, air or water quality. They have only ever cared about power and control, and they’ve funded NGOs to campaign and put pressure on our governments to pass legislation to decarbonise.