ON Saturday, March 23, I attended the wind farm meeting at the Royal Bath Hotel on behalf of Agenda 21. In 1989 at a world summit, Margaret Thatcher made a powerful speech in support of environmental action to achieve a sustainable future and, in 1992, John Major signed up to the charter of the Rio Earth Summit following which Agenda 21 was set up by the government to promote sustainability.

What a misguided and misleading meeting this was. Misguided because it restricted consideration to the single issue of the visual impact of the wind farm and ignored the far more serious issue that wind farms are desperately needed to make us more sustainable and to reduce the enormous threat of climate change. Misleading because on the subject of visual impact it was manipulative and inaccurate. The meeting set out to ridicule the accurate photo montages produced by Navitus which demonstrate that the wind farm will be almost invisible. This was then contrasted with a visual panorama produced by Andrew Lansley of the Challenge Navitus group. This panorama is produced using a long focal length camera. This is equivalent to using a telescope to view the panorama. The meeting also displayed ugly images of a wind turbine alongside Salisbury Cathedral, London’s Gherkin and the Imax building. All designed to emphasise the size of the turbines.

Of course the turbines are large – when built people will take boat trips to see these magnificent structures! But they are also 12 miles away from Bournemouth. A 650-feet high turbine at 12 miles is equivalent to a two-inch model with tower and arms about 1/8 inch wide, about 15 feet away or a 1/4 inch high model viewed from two feet away (do the maths or get some GCSE student to check!). Put it on a window sill and view from 15 feet. Hardly a major feature in the visual panorama. All Challenge Navitas montages are similarly flawed.

Far from being selfishly paranoid about the visual impact, we should be proud to be making a contribution to doing something about the horrendous threat of climate change. Further, is it not selfish and irresponsible of us, who all use electricity, to oppose its local production because it will to a very small extent “spoil the view”?

TONY HAMILTON, acting chairman of Poole Local Agenda 21, Ridgeway, Broadstone