But we must thank them, along with our professional and marketing teams, for their hard work and dedication in maintaining those standards since the first issue in 2012.

We’ve seen a lot of changes – the growth in renewable technologies such as wind, hydro, solar and battery storage; subsidy schemes that have come and gone as well as other schemes that are still operational but are facing challenges for the transition away from that support; such as single wind turbines under the Feed in Tariff (FIT) and biomass heating systems under the Renewable Heat Incentive (RHI). We have also seen the spread of pylons and masts to serve grid electrification and the digital boom.

We covered everything from the farming family who set up a co-op so their wind-power project could let local people participate, to the massive MeyGen tidal project and North Sea decommissioning.

The pages of issue 6 in 2014 EM saw a lively debate between top ministers in the SNP Scottish Government and the Lib-Dem coalition UK administration. Taking our future-watch brief to heart, in 2018 we explored how farming might function in a post-diesel world.

In 2021 we reported on how the bigger blades powering wind energy would soon stand taller than the 683ft high Queensferry Crossing over the River Forth.

In issue 29 we called for a rethink on Shared Rural Network mobile rollout and reported on biosecurity fears for farming land along the new high-voltage overhead cable route along the east coast of Scotland.

See our content page opposite for the engaging stories we carry in this issue.

Rethinking energy

The importance of a safe, reliable energy supply to the UK economy and the health and welfare of its people is increasingly apparent.

For a time, setting a date on net zero greenhouse gas emissions by decarbonising industry, transport and lifestyles looked the best way to tackle what some experts call the existential threat of climate change.

But we didn’t stop consuming oil or gas and so, when Russia invaded Ukraine, world commodity markets soared along with energy prices. While events have strained net zero commitments around the globe, Britain has held out, using law, regulation and subsidy to prioritise green power over fossil fuels.

It’s one thing to encourage innovation in and widespread adoption of renewable energy to bring a better world; quite another to demonise more traditional sources of energy, or pretend they don’t have an important part to play in the UK economy, nor will for many years to come.

The energy transition has been happening for centuries. As the oil historian Daniel Yergin wrote in The Times, Abraham Darby, a metal worker specialising in cast-iron pots, realised in 1709 coal was ‘a more effective means of iron production’ than wood.

Then in 1765, James Watt transformed the steam engine, sparking the Industrial Revolution that heralded Britain’s industrial dominance. It took until the start of the 20th century for coal to overtake wood as the world’s primary energy source. Spurred by the transport revolution, oil took the top spot only in the 1960s.

The Aberdeen-based offshore industry pioneered a visionary outlook in the 1970s by taking up the so-called Houston Effect. This highlighted the Texas oil centre as a model for transferring the knowledge and skills of an entire industry and applying them to generate innovation and wealth in the post-oil era.

In May this year Orsted, the proposed developer of the Hornsea 4 windfarm expansion off the Yorkshire coast, announced it had discontinued the North Sea project, designed to add 2,400 MW of peak capacity – enough to power 2.6 million homes. The Danish company blamed a surge in challenges including higher costs.

Orsted’s move casts doubt over whether the Government’s ‘contracts for difference’ subsidy scheme, designed to promote investment in renewable energy projects, is working effectively or should be reformed. Last year Orsted secured funding for both Hornsea 3 and Hornsea 4 under the CfD system.

I remain confident in the UK’s ability to transition to cleaner, greener energy sources but it’s important to see the process as building on what we have, alongside many other measures we must also take, such as investing in decarbonisation technologies, improving energy efficiency and discouraging waste.  History has taught us that the transition to different energy sources isn’t a quick process and the UK must be prepared to manage that transition effectively rather than abandoning any viable energy source before we have a reliable replacement.