Sir, South Lakeland Friends of the Earth would like to thank the hundreds of people who, in a very few hours, signed letters of support for the Whinash Wind Farm.

They were also emphatic that they did not want a re-birth of nuclear power.

It once again confirms that the majority of the general public supports renewable energy, which 42 studies over the last 13 years have consistently shown.

This spring, Friends of the Lake District sponsored a survey by Leeds Metropolitan University which also confirms this.

It showed that 87 per cent of visitors/tourists and 88 per cent of tourism organisations felt positive towards wind farms in Cumbria.

The study was entitled ‘A Study into the Attitudes of Visitors, Tourists and Tourism Organisations towards Wind Farms on the Boundaries of the Lake District National Park.’ The general public obviously realise that climate change will affect the Lake District and that having a National Park status and green scenery will simply not be enough to protect us from the terrible damage to the landscape, our environment and our society that climate change could cause. Therefore, we should be everything we can to prevent it.

Anita Stirzaker South Lakeland Friends of the Earth Bowness Sir, A major argument advanced by the advocates of wind power is that it is a ‘clean’ form of energy generation, not involving the production of CO2 and other pollutants. This is quite untrue.

By the time each turbine becomes operational, huge amounts of energy have been expended, with all the accompanying pollutants consequent upon the manufacture and transportation of the structure; an expenditure which continues throughout the life of the turbine in maintenance operations.

To this must be added the preparation of the site, with a foundation using thousands of tons of concrete, together with the making of roads to the site, which requires the further expenditure of energy and the production of pollutants.

With the likely on-going provision of hundreds of turbines, there will be a constant emission of these pollutants into the atmosphere.

It is little wonder then that this negative aspect of wind farms is never revealed by the undertakings supplying the turbine, such as West Coast Energy Ltd.

Dennis Woolley Heversham