This article appears as part of the Winds of Change newsletter.

12,000 people have signed a petition to stop the development of one of the world’s largest offshore windfarms, Berwick Bank, off the coast of Scotland, all (or at least mostly) because of the seabirds.

I add 'mostly' because you never know when someone might be more interested in some of the other reasons given for fighting wind, for instance a general antipathy towards Net Zero, but are also jumping onto the bird issue. I add 'mostly' because we live in a world where with any issue there is always someone out there interested in weaponising it for their cause.

But anyway, those 12,000 people who care about the birds are a reminder of a tension in the debate around climate and environment. There is a crucial question around how we balance up the negative impacts on nature of the very infrastructure we are building to wean ourselves off fossil fuels against their benefits.

For me, Berwick Bank, which the Scottish Seabird Centre has said they believe will be the 'deadliest' windfarm in the world for birds, is a reminder that it’s hard to find a system of energy production or emissions removal or mitigation that comes without some impact on nature.

We are always trying to balance up negatives and positives - and that’s not easy, especially when answers that might otherwise be right are being........

© Herald Scotland