Scottish Windfarm Bird Steering Group.

Whilst I was away in Speyside around a month ago I picked up a Scottish Provincial Press supplement entitled Energy North.  It's packed full of really interesting articles, to the extent that I shall try and get hold of future copies.

I'd not realised that such a group existed. It's funded by the Scottish Government, SNH, RSPB, Scottish Renewables, SSE, Scottish Power, RES and Vattenfall and £50,000 has already been spent on various studies with research costing another £54,000 underway.

At a recent meeting in Perth the Scottish Windfarm Bird Steering Group ( SWBSG) announced the development of a Good Practice Guide focussing on how bird populations and their related habitats can be managed effectively where wind farm development is taking place. The research itself is being carried out by Stirling and Newcasle Universities the results from which will feed back into advice available for industry and others in the future.

With repeated concerns being expressed about the potential effects further developments might have upon wildlife, this guide promises to be an extremely useful tool and is a good representative example of how industry, government and the conservation NGO's can work together.