Following recent Scottish Government advice that Scotland was moving out of Lockdown to Phase 1 of their route out of the Covid - 19 crisis, the wind farm sites are now back open to visitors, for unrestricted outdoor exercise. The visitor car park will be opened this Friday and weekend, and will be open as normal on the first Friday, Saturday and Sunday on the month, in line with Government guidelines.

Following the latest Government Advice on non-essential travel and movement, we regret the wind farm site is closed to public access, and the car park will not be opened on the first weekend of the month.

Argyll and Bute Council have recently published the 2019 Community Benefits table for all operational wind farms in Argyll. As in previous years Allt Dearg is the largest single contributor of community benefit in Argyll. Over the last twelve months £ 168,193 of funds where shared between the Ardrishaig Community Trust and the Allt Dearg Educational Trust, which supports young people across mid-Argyll and Cowal. The smaller Srondoire wind farm shared just over £90k between the Tighnabruaich, the Tarbert & Skipness, and the Allt Dearg Educational Trust.

Over the last five years Allt Dearg and subsequently Srondoire Community Wind Farms have delivered very real social and economic benefit to their surrounding Argyllshire Communities. Cash received by the Communities as a result of their ownership in the two projects is approaching £1million, and the total bursary payments to local young people in further education topped £250k in January this year.

A wild fire lit up the skyline above Loch Fyne last night, burning scrub and grassland to the east of the wind farms. The A83 trunk road was briefly closed as the fire threatened the main transport artery to Kintyre. The Ormsary Estate Emergency Team, equipped with the specialist tools needed to tackle hill fires, joined the local Fire Brigade teams to ensure there was no risk to life or structures. This morning at first light the Ormsary Team set out up the Srondoire hillside and extinguished the blaze as it approached neighbouring tree plantations using an ATV mounted fire pump.

When Sròndoire Wind Farm first connected to the grid, there was a limit on the total allowable export. In wet and windy weather, when the 500 kW hydro scheme, which shares Sròndoire's grid connection was at full power, the wind farm was limited to 5.4 MW, around 90% of full output. After several years of complex legal and contractual review Scottish Hydro Power Distribution have removed this contractual limitation, to allow the wind and hydro stations to maximise their production and power exports.

This week Allt Dearg Wind Farm distributed over £135,000 to the Community Trust which holds Ardrishaig’s share in this locally owned wind farm. Together with the recent payments to the Tighnabruaich and Tarbert Trusts who hold similar shares in the neighbouring Sròndoire Wind Farm, and the wind farms’ contributions to the local Educational Trust, this brings the total direct community benefit payments from these projects to well over £ 1.1 million. This is a significant milestone for the projects, and highlights the socio-economic advantages of local ownership in wind power; despite its relatively small capacity Allt Dearg is the single largest contributor of community benefit payments in Argyll.

Much is made of the landscape impact of wind farms. The Allt Dearg and Srondoire Community Wind Farms fund a rolling program of environmental and landscape improvement works as a condition on their planning consents. These works help mitigate the more distant impact of the turbines in the landscape.

Argyll & Bute Council have published details of the Community Benefit payments made by Argyll's Wind Farms in 2017. For the fifth consecutive year Allt Dearg wind farm has set the highest standard for community benefit paid out in Argyll, both in terms of absolute amount and Pounds per MW installed. Whilst Allt Dearg and Sròndoire together now represent less than 5% of the county's installed generation capacity, the community and locally owned wind farms contributed over 38% of the total direct benefit paid out in Argyll.

The Community owned wind farm beat its 2015 record last year, exporting over 44.5 GWh, thanks to near perfect wind conditions and excellent reliability of the generation plant and electrical network. The locally owned project has been amongst the top performing wind farms in the UK since production started in 2013. The UK average “Capacity Factor” for onshore wind was just over 27% in 2017, Allt Dearg managed 52% Capacity, making it the best performing large wind farm on the UK mainland ( the Orkney Islands enjoy higher wind speeds) . Allt Dearg’s average Capacity over the last five years has been 49%, significantly better than the national average capacity factors for both off-shore wind and hydroelectricity.