Beauly to Denny power line:
Back to the Campaigning!

Nicki Baker explains what's in store for the pylon saga over the coming months.

Along with the thaw in mid-February, the threat of the giant pylons of the Beauly-Denny power line re-emerged from their year-long hibernation. After the completion at Christmas 2007 of the Public Inquiry into Scottish & Southern Energy's (SSE's) proposals for an overland, all-overhead power line upgrade, strung on pylons up to 50 metres high, the reporters to the Inquiry went into isolation to write up their findings. On 17 February, they finally presented their confidential report – in six volumes – to the civil servants in the Energy Consents Unit, and to Scottish Ministers.

It is up to the Ministers to reach a final decision on the application, and only when they announce that decision will we get to see the Inquiry's report. We don't know how long this will take – SSE are pressuring for a quick resolution (in their favour, of course) – but it looks likely to take several months, possibly even most of this year.

Key developments
Of course, over the last year there have been further developments to support our cause, and Stirling Before Pylons' Peter Pearson and Caroline Paterson have been working hard to find out about and make sure a number of relevant developments are brought to the attention of the decision-makers while they consider the report. These include:

• Historic
Historic Scotland has made moves to set up a formal list of battlefields in Scotland, with a view to
protecting them from inappropriate development. The Battle of Sheriffmuir site should feature strongly in such a list, being one of the best preserved major battlefields in Scotland.

• European

Over the last 18 months, decisions have been reached to underground power lines in a number of places across Europe. This is to avoid the negative environmental and health impacts of overhead power lines, in the most sensitive areas. This sets a precedent for Scotland!

• Evidence based
More evidence is emerging about the health impacts for people who live near to high-voltage power lines. The latest findings of note, from a huge research study in Switzerland, suggest that the chances of developing dementia are doubled for people who I ive close to such lines for a long period of time.

Show you care
As you'll know if you've been following this saga in our newsletters over the last five years, together with Stirling Before Pylons and Scottish Natural Heritage (and others) we have worked very hard to promote the idea that the line should go underground through the Stirling area, instead of overhead on giant pylons. We are very keen to make sure that those making the decisions should not forget how many people really care about the issue, and we have been working with Stirling Before Pylons to produce some postcards, which we're hoping will get signed by large numbers of people in the coming weeks and sent to local constituency MSPs Keith Brown (Ochil constituency) and Bruce Crawford (Stirling). Both have been strong supporters of our cause in the past, but both are now themselves Ministers in the Scottish Government, and so subject to the discipline of collective decision-making.

We'll be sending a number of these postcards out to each of our members, with the request to get them signed and sent in. If you can get more signatures, do let us know and we'll be delighted to supply as many cards as you can use. We'll also be putting a pdf version of the postcard on our website, so you can download, print, sign, and send it in. Letters to the press are also a great way of bringing the issues to the attention of the decision-makers.

While it's felt good to have a break from campaigning against these monstrous pylon proposals over the last year, now that we're onto the last stretch before the decisions are finally made, we need to do all we can to keep the depth and breadth of public concern really visible. Members' support in previous years has been solid and very valuable – thank you all very much! Do please support us once more.

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