The UK has committed itself to reducing its greenhouse gas emissions by 60% by 2050. In order that this can be achieved the government acknowledges that we need to begin producing much more energy from renewable sources. As a result, it has said that at least 10% of the electricity we use should come from renewable sources by 2010.

As the West Midlands is landlocked, it can not produce any renewable energy from off-shore wind, tidal or wave power. For this reason it has been agreed that the region's target should be reduced to only 5% by 2010. The West Midlands Renewable Energy Strategy suggests that in order to achieve this target, the region will need about 150MW or wind power, or 100 wind turbines the size of the two proposed for Oakland.

Unfortunately, it dows not look like the region is going to be able to achieve even this lower target. At the moment, only 1.25MW of electricity is produced from wind power in the entire West Midlands region. A further 0.04MW is either awaiting or under construction, while schemes totalling 30MW are in planning. However, this still leaves us far short of the 150MW required.

This makes the Oakland Wind Energy Scheme all the more important!

Oakland Employees