Our World  
   
  Wind power reduces greenhouse gas emissions by displacing coal-fired and other carbon dioxide-emitting forms of power generation.  
 
     
   
 
  The evidence is undeniable. Climate change and the consequences of global warming are a reality. It is already having major adverse effects on water supplies, wildlife, agriculture and sea levels.

The impact on the UK climate is already evident and scientists predict extreme weather effects from hotter, drier summers to increased gales, floods and much colder winters.

At the same time, supplies of traditional energy fuels such as oil and gas are rapidly depleting and becoming more expensive. Increasingly, the UK is becoming dependent on other, often less stable, countries for our energy sources. The UK now imports more gas than it produces - a significant milestone also hit for oil supplies by 2010. By 2020, the UK will import 80% of all the gas it consumes. Nuclear power, whilst it is accepted that it could play a part in reducing greenhouse gas emissions, also requires an imported fuel and presents its own additional issues, primarily those of cost and long term waste disposal.

The UK government has pledged to cut carbon dioxide emissions, the largest single contributor to climate change, by 20% of 1990 levels by 2010. To achieve this they have set a goal of generating 10% of UK's electricity by renewable sources by the same year. Wind power is currently the only large scale, cost effective renewable energy source in the UK, best positioned to contribute to this goal.