Vendor / Estate agent didn't mention wind farm!

Smith_007

It's OK, we don't need wind farms.

The Magic Electricity Fairy will wash your clothes, vacuum your carpets, light your way, cook your food, preserve your food, mow your lawn, play an orchestra and put on plays in your living room.......

............as well as allow you to be a NIMBY on internet forums
Like others, I consider wind farms to be a thing of beauty and add to the landscape.


In other news
"The Kyoto Protocol’s first stage comes to an end today [31 Dec], leaving the world with 58 per cent more greenhouse gases than in 1990, as opposed to the five per cent reduction its signatories sought." -CBCNews

googler

phill99 wrote: »

You are wrong.

Caveat emptor.

There is no requirement for the vendor to disclose anything.

It's up to the buyer to make enquiries.

Er, no. Not any more. Read up on the replacement of the Properties Misdescriptions Act with the Consumer Protection Regulations, and let us know if you change this view.

jamesd

phill99 wrote: »

You are wrong. ... Caveat emptor. There is no requirement for the vendor to disclose anything. It's up to the buyer to make enquiries.

"At the outset of the marketing process, a property sales business is not expected to research issues that are outside its line of business, for example, where its business is marketing property and the issues are ones that a surveyor or conveyancer would investigate. However, should it become aware of such information later on, it cannot ignore or suppress it. If the information is material, it will need to disclose the information."

"The CPRs contain broad rules outlining when commercial practices are unfair. These fall into five main categories (see 3.4 in relation to the first four).
1. Giving misleading information to consumers, for example through false or deceptive advertisements or statements.
2. Failing to give necessary information to consumers, for example leaving out or hiding important information
...
4.13 Crucially, you cannot avoid liability for misleading by omission by adopting an 'ask no questions, shut one's eyes and close one's ears' approach ...
Where your client or third parties provide you with information that you know is wrong, or have reason to believe may be wrong, you should follow up with questions , ask for documented proof and/or make your own enquiries in order to satisfy yourself what is correct. For example, if your client says there are 160 years left on the lease, but you have marketed other apartments in the same block recently that only had 75 year leases, you should ask your client for proof that the apartment has as long a lease as they claim. "

If the agent knew, the agent was obliged to disclose because it is a material fact. Worse still if the agent mentioned the nice view or quiet location without also mentioning a planned windmill that they knew about, because of both the optical and noise negative effects.

Proving that the agent knew is the first problem. However, "It transpires also that the estate agent is also a land agent and has had dealings with farmers and wind farm proposals all over the surrounding area" suggests to me that the agent would have been well aware of both the enquiry and the plan. The agent might even have been involved with this specific bit of construction.

angrypirate

Smith_007 wrote: »

It's OK, we don't need wind farms.

The Magic Electricity Fairy will wash your clothes, vacuum your carpets, light your way, cook your food, preserve your food, mow your lawn, play an orchestra and put on plays in your living room.......

............as well as allow you to be a NIMBY on internet forums
Like others, I consider wind farms to be a thing of beauty and add to the landscape.


In other news
"The Kyoto Protocol’s first stage comes to an end today [31 Dec], leaving the world with 58 per cent more greenhouse gases than in 1990, as opposed to the five per cent reduction its signatories sought." -CBCNews

We dont need wind farms, because for every kW of electricity produced by a wind turbine, there needs to be a kW spare capacity from an alternative, reliable source for when the wind stops blowing (ie, gas turbines). Wind farms are a waste of money - they have less than 30% online time (very very low in comparison with other forms) and the amount of energy spent producing the metal, then building, erecting and maintaining them means they arent very green at all.

One wind turbine typically puts out between 1-3 MW. One gas turbine can put out 600 MW and can fire up from nothing to full load in less than 10mins, often capable on a range of different fuels nowadays. The offshore London Array is 245km2 has 175 turbines and has total installed capacity of 630kW (this is total installed - usually there will be some turbines down for maintainence and this figure will also be based on the optimum wind speed). If we are going to rely on wind for our power, we need to get used to unreliable electricity and thousands more of these wind farms.

DRP

angrypirate wrote: »

We dont need wind farms, because for every kW of electricity produced by a wind turbine, there needs to be a kW spare capacity from an alternative, reliable source for when the wind stops blowing (ie, gas turbines). Wind farms are a waste of money - they have less than 30% online time (very very low in comparison with other forms) and the amount of energy spent producing the metal, then building, erecting and maintaining them means they arent very green at all.

One wind turbine typically puts out between 1-3 MW. One gas turbine can put out 600 MW and can fire up from nothing to full load in less than 10mins, often capable on a range of different fuels nowadays. The offshore London Array is 245km2 has 175 turbines and has total installed capacity of 630kW (this is total installed - usually there will be some turbines down for maintainence and this figure will also be based on the optimum wind speed). If we are going to rely on wind for our power, we need to get used to unreliable electricity and thousands more of these wind farms.

but while the wind is blowing, you don't need to use gas to provide that MW, right?

At the very least it reduces the requirement for gas to be used (albeit gas is still needed for 'standby').

Whatever happened to tidal energy generators? they were supposed to be the next big thing when i was a kid (in the 80s/90s).

ILW

Would something a kilometer away be notifiable?

pinkteapot

I feel for OP but to others out there I share the advice about doing your own research. The internet can reveal a huge amount these days.

When we're interested in a house, I look at all the current planning applications in the vicinity on the local council website. I also Google all the place names in the area to look for any local newspaper stories (e.g. residents campaigning against a proposed development). It's very rare for a large proposal to have generated no interest locally.

I also pay the £3 to download the title plan from the Land Registry website, to check there's nothing odd about it (weird rights of way, plot different to what we had thought, etc.). If we waited until the solicitor checked the title plan we'd have already spent money on a survey, mortgage application and initial part of solicitor's fee. That's around £1,000 into the process so for the sake of £3 it's well worth taking a look (especially with older properties, unusual plots, etc.).

Yes, the things above are the job of your solicitor. But (1) it never hurts to check things yourself as well, (2) you can save money even getting to the solicitor stage if something comes out before you make an offer that means you don't want the property, and (3) it might give you a reason to make a lower offer. :money:

You do have to look at what you find objectively - sometimes you'll find things that look alarming and actually there's a reasonably explanation. And if you look at the police crime map you'll never buy a house anywhere!

go_cat

It could be worse it could be a landfill site being built near you

G_M

angrypirate wrote: »

We dont need wind farms, because for every kW of electricity produced by a wind turbine, there needs to be a kW spare capacity from an alternative, reliable source for when the wind stops blowing

As DRP says, when wind blows, we get power. That gets used.

No one (at least not me) is suggesting we only use wind. Of course other sources of energy are needed. Fortunately the wind tends to blow more in winter, when solar power sources are reduced, providing an element of synergy.

(and yes, I'm aware that is a simplistic argument - the point is the more diversity of sources,and the more self-sufficiency, the better)

G_M

jamesd wrote: »

It's very likely that both the vendor and the selling agent knew of the plan and had an obligation to disclose. The problem is proving it.

The number of kilowatts generated in the UK from Russian gas is about zero, as is the number of cubic metres of gas imported from Russia. You can see a diagram showing the gas flows across much of Europe and look for yourself. Our gas supply comes almost completely from our own sources, Norway, the Netherlands and via LNG imports, with only a little from other sources.

Thanks James- an interesting read.

Though given the inter-relationship with Europe, "we" are still highly dependant on Russia. If that dried up, European prices would rise which would affect us.

And you only have to see how petrol prices responded to a crisis in Nigeria for example, to see how energy vulnerable we are.