The Scottish government is holding strong against Donald Trump’s bullying by going ahead and approving an important offshore wind center that he opposes.
Trump, who strong-armed his golf course on the government and local communities in the first place, opposes the wind farm because he doesn’t like the view.
Building the golf course destroyed Scotland’s ancient sand dunes and disrupted the lives of the people who live there, described in the documentary, You’ve Been Trumped.
But the 100 megawatt European Offshore Wind Deployment Centre will now go forward placing 11 wind turbines off the coast to power 49,000 homes, half the population of Aberdeen.
The 651-foot high turbines will be sited 1.5 miles offshore.
Also planned is an offshore wind-testing center where developers will be able to test technologies before deploying them, cutting capital costs and risks.
The Centre is viewed as an important opportunity to establish the country as a hub for offshore development.
This is just the beginning. Trump wants to stop the world’s largest offshore wind farm, also planned for the area. 339 turbines would supply energy for 800,000 households – about 40% of Scotland’s population.
Scotland’s goal is to generate all its electricity from
renewable energy by 2020.
Trump of course fired back with a statement, saying. "We will
spend whatever monies are necessary to see to it that these huge and unsightly industrial wind turbines are never constructed."
Now that Trump owns a golf course there, he plans to file a lawsuit to stop "the destruction of Aberdeen and Scotland
itself."
He has postponed plans to surround the golf course with a five-star hotel, 500 homes and 950 rental units because of the wind farm (boo hoo!).
In response, Fergus Ewing, Minister of Energy, Enterprise and Tourism, says: "The Scottish government is committed to the successful and sustainable development of an offshore wind sector. The industry may contribute more than 7
billion pounds to Scotland’s economy and support as many as 28,000 direct jobs and an additional 20,000 indirect jobs by 2020."
Scotland is also moving aggressively on tidal energy – luckily that won’t ruin Trump’s view.
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