This will be one of the world’s largest Scottish offshore wind farms capable of generating enough clean renewable energy to power over six million homes. Berwick Bank will increase Scotland’s renewable electricity capacity by almost 25%; boosting our effort to achieve net zero by 2045.
In addition to this offshore development, our local community magazine, The Atholl & Breadalbane Quair (August 2025 edition), cites Councillor John Duff, that applications for two new wind farms in Calliachar and North Logiealmond will be made (p 18). These will consist of 42 turbines with an approximate height of 200-250m. This is at least twice the height of our existing windfarm at Griffin and Calliachar. These new developments give rise to questions about our capacity as a nation to utilize the extra electricity generated and whether the benefits of this ‘green revolution’ will be shared with the communities in which the windfarms are located.
Is our national grid coping with the increased supply of green energy?
The short answer to this valid question is ‘No’. The current situation is that our windfarms are sometimes paid to stop producing electricity due to ‘grid constraints’. These payments, known as ‘constraint payments’, are essentially payments for not producing electricity. According to EnergyVoice, an energy magazine, Britain in 2025 paid approximately £180,000 per hour to switch off windfarms. This totaled £252m for the first two months of 2025. This was a 60% increase on the 2024 figure and was necessary to avoid blackouts on the National Grid. Constraint payments are estimated to reach £1.8bn for 2025 an increase from an estimated £1.5bn in 2024.
What can we do about this?
Loadshifting is an idea that goes a long way to addressing these issues and holds out hope for a better, more equitable future.
The basic idea is to install a household battery to every household connected to the National Grid. This is the vast majority of homes in Scotland. Battery storage allows householders to keep electricity stored and ready to use it when you need it. Batteries can be loaded when electricity is abundant and used when the householder needs it. The advantage to the wind farm owners would be that they could top up the nation’s batteries when it is windy. They would have the ability to store energy when it was abundant and allow their customers to have access to electricity that we do not currently produce.
The Scottish Government could pay for every household to have a battery installed (rough estimate £10k per household) free of charge. In 2024 there were 2.55 million households in Scotland. The total cost comes in at £25.5 bn. Given constraint payments of £1.8 bn for 2025, this gives a payback time of 15 years at today’s prices. A household battery enables the wind farms to shift the load to every household and deliver cheaper (at times even free) electricity to every household in Scotland.
A game changer
It will deliver cheaper electricity to every household, where it is needed.
It will lift thousands out of fuel poverty.
It could be an excellent use of funds from pension schemes which could yield regular monthly returns over the lifetime of the batteries installed in houses.
It would improve the national housing stock at a stroke.
Fuel poverty in Scotland
Fuel poverty is the condition by which a household is unable to heat (or cool) their home to an adequate temperature. It is caused by low income, high fuel prices, poor energy efficiency, unaffordable house prices and poor quality private rental housing. The Scottish Fuel Poverty Advisory Panel states on their website,
‘’The day-to-day reality of living in fuel poverty is hard and there are now 861,000 households estimated to be living in fuel poverty in Scotland.’’
Pitlochry Climate Café
This idea was discussed at the Climate Café Pitlochry. Find out more about Climate Cafes, their work and how you can get involved by following this link.
More on the environment.
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