Community-owned wind farm Point and Sandwick Trust (PST) held their annual Away Day at Lews Castle, Stornoway earlier this week.  The Trust is responsible for the building and operation of the UK’s biggest community-owned wind farm, based on the Isle of Lewis and the annual meeting of Board members, staff and consultants is a chance to assess what’s working and what the future holds. On the agenda this year were plans for fuel poverty mitigation this coming winter and further ways to best support the local community through grant support and development funding.

In addition to the grant giving side of the organisation, considerable time was given to looking behind the scenes at the complexities of managing the wind farm.  PST’s wind farm, built on common grazings at Beinn Ghrideag, has three 9MW turbines and began operation in 2015.  Since then, more than £4.3M wind farm income has been used for community support with many more millions leveraged into the local area with PST help.

General Manager DJ MacSween commented, “The philosophy of PST has always been to promote well-being and we are committed to that aim.  It’s a pleasure to give support to community projects and organisations in the local area, whether it’s capital funding for something as extensive as restoration of the Garrabost Mill or making sure that the children at Sgoil an Rubha have a minbus to take them on school trips, everything we support has an important purpose”.

“However, behind the scenes there is a huge amount of work that goes on to keep the turbines operating well and in managing the intricacies of running a large community wind farm. Planned and occasionally unplanned maintenance, breakdowns, grid issues, banking arrangements, legal and regulatory issues, negotiating power agreements pricing, the list goes on and is rarely visible from the outside.  The Away Day this year was a great chance for all of us, Board members, staff and consultants to get together and look at what we’re doing and how our activities best benefit the local community.  We’re excited about the next steps.”

In the afternoon of the Away Day, the group went along to the Deep Water Terminal for a tour of the latest developments at the Stornoway Port which opened earlier this year.  The PST team were welcomed by Alex Macleod, CEO of Stornoway Port and were able to see some of the extensive work that has gone on to develop the Deep Water Terminal as a cruise ship destination, establishing Stornoway as the only port in the north-west of Scotland where large ships can get alongside.  In addition to the cruise ship development, the Deep Water Facility is set to support future renewable energy developments.