Wind turbine owner hopes to reduce his carbon footprint

The wind turbine on Lark Hill, Dobcross - Photo Stuart Littleford

A Dobcross resident is hoping to reduce his carbon footprint as well as his electricity bills after having a state of the art wind turbine installed at his property.

John Leonard, of Parkfield farm, took the decision to have the wind turbine installed partly because he had always wanted one from being a child. He used to travel in Wales a lot as a youngster and always took time to stop off at the Alternative Technology Centre, near Aberystwyth.

He says he was always fascinated by alternative technology and loved the look of the wind turbines and as there are a lot more around these days that are suitable for domestic use, he decided to get one.

According to the Energy Saving Trust, a well-sited 6kW turbine can generate around 10,000kWh and the equivalent of around 5.2 tonnes of carbon dioxide a year. Wind turbines are also eligible for Feed-in Tariffs and you will earn a tariff for each kWh of electricity generated by your system.

John told Saddleworth News: “I want to be as carbon neutral here as possible, we don’t have gas and I was spending  a lot of money on fuel, when I weighed it all up the environmental impact would be much less than having large tankers keep coming up all the time.

“Being from South Yorkshire I was used to looking out at the slag heaps and so have seen the other side of energy production. I’m not using electricity that has been produced by oil or coal, and I can also put energy back into the grid as well.

“Although there have been quite a large amount of costs involved in the project I‘m sure they will be recovered, but it’s by no means the main objective. I think I will get the cost of the turbine back within five years – but the main reasons for going ahead were environmental.

“I do feel for people who don’t like them, you either hate them or love them and I love them, and in Spain there are thousands and they do work. I know generating electricity in other ways isn’t very clean.

“There are other structures in the area like pylons, radio transmitters and phone masts, we just get used to them being part of the landscape.

“When I set out to get planning permission two years ago I was told it would be turned down so I withdrew from making an application at that point. I went on to have a number of surveys done at my expense, some of these were to gauge effects on wildlife, such as birds and bats and to check the best possible position for it to be sited.

“It took over 18 months and some reductions in the tower height before people were happy, I do understand some people will not be happy with it, and for that I apologise.”

Oldham Council did oppose the erection of the wind turbine but the decision was later overturned on appeal.

Author: Jude Gidney - Editor

If you would like to share an interesting story, achievement, photo or something you just want to happily shout about please send it in an email to hello@saddleworthlife.com We'd ❤ to hear from you!!