Donald Trump’s wind farm hearing begins

American tycoon Donald Trump's legal challenge against a wind farm project in Aberdeen Bay is set to begin today at the Court of Session.


Trump launched legal proceedings in May in an attempt to stop construction of the £230m offshore wind turbine test facility being built near his luxury golf course.

Earlier this year the Scottish Government approved consent for the project which has also been awarded up to €40m (£34m) of European funding.

Commenting ahead of the case, WWF Scotland director Lang Banks said: “It’s depressing to think that Donald Trump has nothing better to do than use his vast wealth to try and undermine Scotland’s aim of becoming a cleaner, greener, job-creating nation. We hope that in the end the court agrees that giving the go-ahead to this development was the right decision.

Scotland is home to a quarter of Europe’s offshore wind resource and studies estimate that the country’s offshore wind industry could create 28,000 jobs by 2020 and contribute more than £7bn of investment to the economy.

“It would be a great pity if Donald Trump was in any way responsible for frustrating Scotland’s ambition to generate clean power and green jobs,” added Banks.

The work on the European Offshore Wind Deployment Centre (EOWDC) could lead to turbine foundation designs being developed at the test facility.

Leigh Stringer

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