Tourism chief backs windfarm opponents (From The Westmorland Gazette)

Tourism chief backs windfarm opponents

9:50am Wednesday 31st January 2007 in

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BROADCASTER and author Eric Robson has spoken out against plans to build a windfarm on fells alongside the M6 at Shap.

The Cumbrian, who chairs Cumbria Tourism, has become a patron of Community Opposed to Shap Turbines (COST).

Mr Robson joins Sir Chris Bonington and Lord Melvyn Bragg in opposing the creation of the Shap Renewable Energy Park, by Gamesa Energy UK, which would comprise of ten wind turbines, each 100m high.

He said: "It is sad that so soon after the victory for common sense at Whinash, Gamesa Energy want to install huge turbines on land just up the road from there.

"The same arguments that won the day for Whinash hold good for Shap: the proposed windfarm will do very little good, but will do immense harm.

"It would be too close to the national park, visible from several national trails and would create an inescapable moving distraction from the splendour of Cumbria's natural horizons."