When we pay our energy bills we pay an extra fee to save the planet. This money is used to subsidise the wind farms that have sprung up around the country. These wind farms help the national grid by taking requirement away from the power stations. The government agreed to pay so much money to the wind farms to finance them.
It has now been revealed that the wind farms need very little workforce to run them. In fact the amount paid to the wind farms is way in excess of their operating costs. So where is this surplus cash going?
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A new analysis of government and industry figures shows that wind turbine owners received £1.2billion in the form of a consumer subsidy, paid by a supplement on electricity bills last year. They employed 12,000 people, to produce an effective £100,000 subsidy on each job.
The disclosure is potentially embarrassing for the wind industry, which claims it is an economically dynamic sector that creates jobs. It was described by critics as proof the sector was not economically viable, with one calling it evidence of “soft jobs” that depended on the taxpayer..........................In Scotland, which has 203 onshore wind farms — more than anywhere else in the UK — just 2,235 people are directly employed to work on them despite an annual subsidy of £344million. That works out at £154,000 per job......................Even if the maximum number of jobs that have been forecast are created, by 2020 the effective subsidy on them would be £80,000 a year.
One source, who owns several wind farms, and did not wish to be named, said: “Anybody trying to justify subsidies on the basis of jobs created is talking nonsense. Wind farms are not labour intensive.”
Why is it that whenever someone mentions a government subsidy there is someone who is ready to take advantage and rip us all off? Will this money be recovered and reimbursed through our energy bills?
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/energy ... ealed.html