Category Archives: Scotland

Losing our marbles over Stonehenge | Brief letters

Judiciary | Queen’s leases | Travel plans | Ancient showroom | Stonehenge

Donald Trump’s acquittal in the US Senate (Report, 14 February) surely provides the best possible evidence for never allowing politicians to get involved in judicial decision-making. Their priorities lie in other directions.
Les Baker
Fordingbridge, Hampshire

• The Queen gets £220m a year for seabed lease options for windfarms (Queen’s property chief delays sale of Scottish seabed windfarm plots, 12 February). Really? Perhaps she could give the country her cut given the future costs of the climate crisis, Covid and the expected hardships to come?
Stephen King
London

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Queen’s property chief delays sale of Scottish seabed windfarm plots

Auction paused after runaway bids for leases in England and Wales hand windfalls to Queen and Treasury

The Queen’s property manager in Scotland has delayed the auction of Scottish seabed plots for windfarms after runaway bids for leases in England and Wales handed the Queen and the Treasury a multibillion-pound windfall.

Crown Estate Scotland paused its auction in order to carry out a review of the process after the “unprecedented” bidding in an auction for England and Wales lease options last week reached record highs.

How important is offshore wind power to the UK energy system?
Offshore windfarms generated 8% of the UK’s electricity in 2018, according to estimates by trade body RenewableUK. The UK has more offshore wind capacity than anywhere in the world, with 37 projects made up of nearly 2,000 turbines. There is nearly 8GW of capacity today, 1.3GW of which was added in 2018. Another 5GW is already committed to. The UK has 44% of all European offshore wind power capacity.

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