And this is a bad thing?

"The thousands of turbines in operation, being built or in the planning stage, mean that Scotland will easily overshoot its electricity target" says Tory MEP Struan Stevenson. Sounds good? No, apparently this is a bad thing: "The march of the wind farms under Alex Salmond and the SNP has to be brought to a halt."

And I thought one of the major problems with wind as far as the likes of Struan Stevenson was concerned was that they couldn't deliver. Now that it's clear that they can deliver the generation capacity, the issue is switched to them not being the lowest cost option. We already knew that though. The point is that we either have to be willing to pay for low carbon generation, or we have to put a price on carbon such that fossil alternatives aren't the lowest cost.

Unless you also happen to be a climate change denier. Stevenson's collegue Murdo Fraser claims to want to be evidence-led: "But as with all new technologies, we must be evidence-led in exploring the best and safest routes of development". So is it only the evidence that dirty fossil fuels may also be currently the cheapest option that counts, or can we add evidence for the cost of the long term harm they'll cause?