Journalists, campaigners, researchers and activists gathered in Glasgow to discuss how communities could better benefit from Scotland’s renewables boom.
“We’re here because we want to tell better, richer stories about our communities; not ignoring the difficulties and challenges, but leaning into those complexities.”
These were the words of Rhiannon J Davies, founder of the Scottish Beacon, on Friday last week when journalists, campaigners and experts from across Scotland gathered in The Byres Community Hub in Glasgow. The event celebrated the launch of a special one-off magazine, The Power Shift – the result of a collaborative reporting project co-edited by Davies and Mike Small.
The Power Shift project explores Scotland’s green energy boom and what it means for communities. It has been supported by the Tenacious Journalism Awards and campaign group Uplift.
It also marked the launch of a new environmental journalism network for Scotland, made up not only of reporters and editors but experts, campaigners and researchers like those at Friday’s event.
Over a series of panel discussions, presentations, and roundtable conversations, attendees highlighted the importance of community involvement in decisions about green energy developments; the need to confront misinformation and climate denialism; how communities can get their fair share of the benefits of renewable developments; and lots more.
“If it’s going to be done to us, we should gain some community legacy”
The event kicked off with a panel of journalists who each contributed stories to the Power Shift magazine. Jane Cruickshank from the Bellman in Stonehaven reported on wind farm substation developments in local forests. Hans Marter from Shetland News spoke about the piece he co-wrote with Erin Rizatto Devlin which compared the constitutional set-up of the Shetland Islands and the Åland archipelago, an autonomous region of Finland in the Baltic Sea, comparable to Shetland in size, population, and exposure to renewable energy projects.
Silvia Muras from the Kyle Chronicle shared her reporting on a surge of new windfarm proposals in the North Central Highlands, and Paul Dobson from The Ferret discussed an investigation which found that more than 20 wind farms in Scotland are failing to pay recommended dividends to local communities, potentially costing communities over £50m.
The panel highlighted how communities can both appreciate the need for renewable energy, while still being concerned about the impact of developments on their own doorsteps – especially when it feels like the wealth they generate does not always benefit the local community.
“If it’s going to be done to us, which is how it feels at least, we should gain some community legacy,” said Cruickshank. “You have your own personal environment as well as the global environment. It’s perfectly feasible to have concerns for one and also the other – and they can be in conflict.”
Speakers also shared the difficulty of accessing clear and transparent information about new developments in their communities, with Cruickshank comparing her reporting experience to “putting a jigsaw together” and Muras highlighting the practice of ‘salami slicing’, where developments are systematically split into several parts for approval, obscuring the overall picture.
In this context it can be easy for climate denialism to creep in, most panelists agreed, again highlighting the need for communities to be informed, involved and empowered about developments in their areas.
“One of the big things allowing it to creep in is the feeling in lots of communities that people are disempowered,” said Dobson. “[They don’t feel they can] register opposition in a way that’s impactful or meaningful; they don’t feel they have any stake in the political system… community wealth building is a bulwark against this kind of thinking.”
“The same wind stripping heat from your home is the thing delivering record profits to shareholders”
Next, attendees heard from a panel of campaigners, each working on different aspects of community energy, wealth and empowerment.
Flick Monk from Platform shared clips from a new documentary film “highlighting different voices of the energy transition, with the aim of reinvigorating discussion around these complex issues.” Nat Gorodnitski from Uplift introduced the‘Our Power’ campaign, a set of demands for the next Scottish Government aimed at ensuring people in Scotland get a fair share of their energy wealth.
Josh Doble from Community Land Scotland highlighted the organisation’s current priorities, including increasing community energy and shared ownership, improving community benefit payments and establishing a wealth fund managed by communities which would enable community organisations to acquire or develop their own revenue-generating assets.
Daniel Gear from Voar in Shetland provided a powerful insight into the experience of communities affected by renewable developments, telling attendees: “If you live in the central mainland of Shetland, you get up in the morning, open your curtains, and see the largest onshore windfarm in the UK.
“At the same time, a letter comes through the door; it’s your electricity bill and it’s higher than it’s ever been before, and you realise you’re almost certainly going to need help to pay it. You’re in poverty.
“The newspaper is delivered, you see that the people who own the wind farm are reporting record profits, and you realise that the same wind stripping heat from your home is the thing delivering the record profit to these shareholders, who built something you didn’t really want in the first place.”
The panel discussed the need for local authorities to have greater powers and funding around planning and renewables developments, and once again highlighted the importance of community and public ownership and control.
“Ultimately it gives the government and communities more options,” said Monk. “The crucial question is about this new industry that’s emerging: how are we going to set it up in a way that learns the lessons of the past – privatised oil and gas industries that saw profits go to very few people, pockets of the country very dependent on industries now facing job losses and economic uncertainty?”
“Creating that safe space where people can find nuance”
The afternoon saw Clare Harris from the Local Storytelling Exchange introduce a new film focusing on communities along the east coast, on the line of the Great Grid Upgrade – the UK’s largest energy upgrade in generations and one which has been divisive for the communities most affected.
The film aims to “try and find middle ground and space we can inhabit together,” Harris said. Tackling polarisation is about making space for people to have challenging but constructive conversations, she told attendees. While the energy transition is widely discussed, far less attention is given to what might come afterwards. “[It’s about creating] that safe space where people can find nuance and say: what next?”
Harris’ primer on polarisation led into a series of roundtable discussions, where attendees discussed how to effectively tackle it, as well as a range of other questions including how to tell better stories; how to amplify community voices; how to build our ‘democratic muscle’; and how to strengthen our information ecosystems.
Discussions were rich and wide-ranging while also highlighting some common themes: attendees highlighted the importance of getting people physically into the room together, as well as using arts and creativity to explore these issues and move beyond polarisation. Others emphasised how the planning system needs to be improved to give communities as much power as developers.
Communities need to be given agency and power, rather than being “beaten over the head with what’s not working,” attendees suggested, and people need to see tangible blueprints about what local democracy and a “collective people’s movement” can look like in practice.
“Great, rich nuanced discussion”
In closing, Rhiannon J Davies explained that copies of the Power Shift magazine would be sent to every incoming MSP and to libraries around the country, as well as being distributed in local communities across Scotland by members of the network – from Shetland and the Western Isles to Argyll, Midlothian and Sutherland.
The wider Environmental Journalism Network will continue to meet regularly, creating a space for complex and nuanced discussions with Scotland’s communities at their core.
“I’ve really enjoyed today; there’s been absolutely great, rich, nuanced discussion,” said Daniel Gear from Voar in the Shetland Islands. “There’s something about the ability to have this kind of discussion with no agenda other than to examine these complex issues in as nuanced a way as possible… I can’t think of any other space that exists to do that.”
If you would like to receive a copy of The Power Shift magazine, you can order online here.
If you are interested in joining the new Environmental Journalism Network that is open to journalists, campaigners, researchers and experts, sign up here.
