MORE than £31 million in public cash has been written off in just two years amid a series of failed investments in renewable energy companies. Scottish Enterprise, the public body tasked with boosting economic development, will see no return on its £15.2m investment in Aquamarine Ltd which went bust last year after failing to make wave power commercially viable. The loss emerged in the quango’s annual accounts for 2015-16, which were laid before parliament yesterday. It comes just one year after Scottish Enterprise admitted it had lost the £16.3m it pumped into Pelamis, another tidal energy firm. The biggest write-off in the agency’s 25-year history, it was described at the time as “exceptional”. Now the second huge loss in as many years has prompted fresh questions over the SNP Government’s energy strategy and sparked doubts over its claim that Scotland can become “the Saudi Arabia of tidal power”. Scottish Conservative MSP Alex Johnstone said there was a “definitely a place” for wave energy. “However, these two major losses serve as a warning about renewable energy,” he said. “The SNP is utterly obsessed with it, and that’s to the determinant of more dependable sources. Perhaps if it had a more rounded approach, the taxpayer wouldn’t have had to write off such significant sums in these instances.”
Herald 8th Oct 2016 read more »