BACKGROUND
It’s fair to say that the facilities for visitors at Westmill are basic, and the lack of shelter on our exposed site largely limits our guided tours to the warmer months. The lack of proper toilet and handwashing facilities also restricts what we can do, especially with our younger visitors.
We believe our work is important in educating and enthusing the public about renewable energy and the fight against climate change. We’d like to have more visitors and to offer them a better visit especially at this point in time where interest is building as concern about climate change rises.
In 2019, we began planning to build the ‘Westmill Centre’ to welcome our guest and visitors. Our plans included a ‘yurt’ – a permanent canvas based structure big enough to hold a primary school class – and a small composting toilet block as well as improved access facilities.
The Westmill Centre was set to provide much-needed shelter and toilets, as well as improving the safety of the site entrance for coaches. The Centre would have also made the Westmill site more accessible, with disabled parking and a disabled toilet. We rely on a dedicated group of volunteer guides, and the new facilities would have made their job more comfortable and rewarding.
We also envisaged the Westmill Centre providing a unique space for like-minded organisations to use for training and events.
We truly believe the Westmill Centre was set to offer a great educational resource. The flat, accessible site offered a unique opportunity to get up close and personal with wind turbines and solar panels. At this time of climate emergency, our planned improvements to road safety, toilets and a warm space were set to allow us to make even better use of this great site, demonstrating to our visitors the power of community owned renewable energy.
CURRENT SITUATION
After careful consideration, the WeSET trustees, in close consultation with the Westmill Solar Co-operative and Westmill Wind Farm Co-operative, decided not to trigger the build of the Westmill Centre. Despite considerable progress during the first few months of 2021 to mitigate risk, some cannot be sufficiently mitigated and indeed are growing – like completing in time to claim a grant from LEADER.
These risks, combined with higher-than-budgeted-for costs, due in part to the impact of COVID-19, means the funding ask, and risk on, the Westmill Solar Co-operative and Westmill Wind Farm Co-operative, exceeds what they could reasonably bear.
WeSET, Westmill Solar Co-operative and Westmill Wind Farm Co-operative are all very disappointed that the project cannot be progressed at this time. We will review what is needed from the Centre and alternative ways in which this might be achieved.
