Sunday 3 April 2011

Has Green Cornwall gone a bit brown round the edges?

Just over a year ago, to a fanfare of triumphant trumpets, Cornwall Council launched Green Cornwall: council vehicles were to be all-electric, there were to be battery-charging points up and down the A30, Cornwall was to benefit from a £1 billion solar energy gold rush, and there were to be many more windfarms, including some built on council land.

The reality: the last Labour government never came through with the money for the battery-charging points, the current Coalition government is downsizing its support for the solar industry to the point where many of the approved schemes will probably never be built, and the number of windfarm planning applications approved in Cornwall over the past 12 months is precisely zero.

I'm grateful to Tom Flanagan, corporate director for environmental and planning issues, and to councillor Julian German, Cabinet member responsible for these things, for taking the time to explain to me how they see Green Cornwall in 2011. It is, they say, still with us and they are trying to find ways to progress it.

You can hear more about Green Cornwall, and the view from County Hall, on BBC Radio Cornwall's breakfast programme tomorrow morning.

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