At a meeting to promote Scotland’s role in the provision of renewable energy, National Farmers’ Union of Scotland president John Kinnaird spoke of the huge potential for biofuels.
“It’s a bit like fruit: why import it to this country when it can actually be produced in this country?”
He said renewable energy should not be hauled around the world, making it a cost in carbon terms, when it is sitting on the doorstep.
And he said, the next step was to put pressure on governments, with the Scottish parliament elections in May next year an ideal opportunity. The Scottish government has already set a target of 40% renewable energy by 2020.
Mr Kinnaird said that while the Scottish countryside had a huge potential to combat climate change, investment was also vital. The same level of capital grants as elsewhere in Europe were needed, he said, to help the government meet its targets.
