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Donald Trump can make all the outrageous claims about wind energy that he wants to on Twitter. In the pages of newspapers in Scotland, however, there are limits. On Tuesday, authorities there decided he exceeded them, and ordered he remove anti-wind ads he'd paid for. The problem, as always with Donald Trump, was hyperbole.
For months, Trump has been battling to keep an offshore wind farm from being built near a golf course he's developing on the northeast coast of the country. The proposal is part of a much-larger push by the country to transition to renewable energy. Its 11 turbines would offer more than 80 megawatts of energy, once operational.
Trump's fight against the project is not going very well, in part because his campaign is predicated on presenting wind energy as a horrible, economy-killing, bird-killing nuisance. This is a hard argument to make, but he's trying, mostly on Twitter. Vice's Motherboard blog has cataloged a number of them.
Don't let them build a wind turbine in your backyard (or near your house). It will destroy your property value.
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 19, 2012
That isn't true.
Wind turbines are not only killing millions of birds, they are killing the finances & environment of many countries & communities.
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 17, 2012
That also isn't true. (In fact, it's likely that Trump's high-rises kill more birds than the turbines do.)
Ugly wind turbines have destroyed the entrance to Palm Springs, CA. These monstrosities are ruining landscapes (cont) tl.gd/jav9mk
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 17, 2012
That is, at best, subjective.
The anti-wind turbine movement in Scotland against @alexsalmond is amazing--keep going Scots, save your country!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 22, 2012
And that last one is just sad. That "anti-wind turbine movement" is what Trump had been spending enormous time and energy trying to foment. In March, it ended up being for naught. The government announced that the project would move forward, thanks in part to the advocacy of politician Alex Salmond. Trump's response to the decision was characteristically reserved. "[W]e will be bringing a lawsuit within the allocated period of time," he said in a statement, "to stop what will definitely be the destruction of Aberdeen and Scotland itself." Definitely.