90% of Stroud District say yes to changing Stroud’s energy future

The results are in, and people in the Stroud District have voted overwhelmingly for a future powered by wind.

The vote ran for a total of nine weeks and with nearly 1,000 votes cast, 89.9% of votes cast answered ‘yes’ to the question, “Should we make 50% of Stroud’s electricity from local wind energy?”.

Thank you to everyone who took the time to give us their view, either online or by post.

5050 has given a voice to the silent majority in favour of powering Stroud with wind. The vote was intended to kick-start the debate about our energy future in the Stroud District and demonstrate to the Council what people in the area really think.

The need for us to harness renewable energy in the UK is clear and compelling. Firstly we have the looming global energy crisis – the world is running out of fossil fuels, our own North Sea is all but depleted, and we rely on increasingly unstable parts of the world for our energy. Secondly we can’t afford to burn fossil fuels anymore, it’s the biggest single cause of Climate Change in the UK – and that threatens our ability to live on this planet.

Ecotricity’s first ever turbine was built right here. Thirteen years have gone by since then and it’s still the only turbine in the District – in the County in fact. We all need to be taking more action, and more quickly, the climate won’t wait. Climate change and energy security are such pressing issues, much more has to be done to enable wind energy in all parts of the country.

The survey results echo our experiences in other parts of the country, where there is ‘massive but passive’ support for our wind farm plans. Opinion polls consistently tell the same story – generally upwards of 80 per cent of people in every opinion poll survey ever undertaken in the UK support wind energy, including in their own backyard. The Stroud 5050 campaign has proved that Stroud District is no exception, and the public will is there to make a change.

We’re really chuffed with the result, but we also know this isn’t the end of the road. It’s an important step to making sure that the voice of the silent majority gets properly heard in Stroud. These are our thoughts, we’d love to hear yours…

Some of the comments being submitted recently to this blog contravene our blog guidelines. We do not believe in censorship – we want an open, honest and frank discussion. After much internal discussion we have published these comments – with no real content removed, just the offensive parts.

The tone of much of the conversation has sunk well below what we’d deem acceptable. Apart from using unfounded and unsubstantiated ‘facts’, many have decided to resort to personal attacks. This is not conducive to grown up discussion, which is, after all, the reason we have any commenting system at all.

This website is about climate change, it’s about local solutions, it’s about the future and finding out what the people of Stroud REALLY want.

In future all comments not adhering to the comment guidelines will not be published. What we need is an informed debate, one backed up with reason. Not plain old tit-for-tat mud-slinging.

We have decided to ‘flip’ the order of this blog over. So that new content doesn’t get lost and we can bring other voices and arguments into the debate that need to be heard. We have some exciting posts coming up from leading voices in the region which we’ll post in the next few days.

In the meantime we’re looking into the issue of the missing postal coupons. We have used a company we had good faith in. We’re going through the votes we’ve had in to see where the gaps are in responses – anyone out there who didn’t receive a postal vote, can you just email team@stroud5050.org with your post code so we can look into it in more detail?

The bottom line is this IS about the planet where we all have to live. This is our planet and everywhere is our back yard.

Hi all! Many thanks to everyone for all the great comments and questions so far, pro and con, both here online and via the postal votes. And thank you all for being respectful while passionate… creating clean, affordable, effective energy solutions for our collective future is everyone’s responsibility, affects us all and can only happen if we work together.

There clearly are still lots of questions around green energy and wind turbines in particular – so come and talk with Team Stroud5050! We will be at the Stroud Farmer’s Market for the next 6 Saturdays, and we want to meet you!

And on Sept 26th from 10.30-12.30 someone from our wind development team will be on hand to answer general questions about our Berkeley Vale proposal.

Get the latest Flash Player to see this player.

Over 1500 hundred people turned up at Thistledown Environmental Centre near Nailsworth on Sunday 13th September for the free event. We gave away nearly 500 kites, and plenty of free soft drinks courtesy of Bottlegreen. Plus with a professional kite demonstration, fantastic kite flying weather, and a nearly sold out ice cream van – we couldn’t have asked for more.

The event took place amidst 70 acres of natural environment and wildlife in the shadow of Gloucestershire’s first and currently only wind turbine at Nympsfield, and proved a cracking location to celebrate the power of the wind and launch our Stroud5050 campaign to make 50% of our local energy green. Thanks to all who attended and helped make this such a great day.

We’re kicking off the energy debate in the Stroud District by pushing for 50% of our energy needs to come from clean, green energy from wind turbines right here in Stroud. We need your help!

It’s an issue we’ve felt passionately about since we were founded here back in 1995. We’ve already proven the viability of the wind energy with one local turbine, so why not more?

Imagine if half of the district’s electricity was completely renewable, actively contributing to the area and supported by local residents…