Sorry 'The Second Coming' don't want to hijack your thread BUT just had to reproduce this bit from the P&J, if not only to see what the Wickers think of living in "A Deprived Town"!
Auditors reveal failings of Highland Energy Scheme
Catalogue of blunders by officials cost £16m [£16,000,000 - looks worse that way]
By Iain Ramage
Published: 13/01/2010
A bungled Highland Council green energy scheme to heat homes in a deprived town and cash in by feeding the national grid blew £16million of public money.An auditors report, discussed in private yesterday, exposed a catalogue of failures by council officials – past and present – who oversaw the community project in the Pulteneytown area of Wick.
The local authority’s chief executive is now deciding whether anyone should face disciplinary action over the failed Caithness Heat and Power scheme.The 30-page report by the council’s head of internal audit, Nigel Rose, was shown to more than 60 councillors who attended a special meeting in Inverness yesterday. Councillors were not allowed to keep a copy.
External auditor Lynn Bradley, of Audit Scotland, who also attended, spoke of the “rigorous and scrupulous nature” of the document.
It highlighted “weaknesses in formal project appraisal, business planning, governance arrangements and statement of resource implications”. It also stated that “technological and financial risk assessments were not adequately undertaken or reported to the council”.
The scheme was set up in 2004 by Highland Council, Inver House Distillers Ltd and the Pulteneytown People’s Project. The council took control four years later when it became clear the project was not achieving its aims. Wider circulation of the audit report was barred to protect the identities of individuals and because the council has sought legal advice on possible action against the manufacturers of equipment used in the project.
Almost 250 homes had benefited from heat and hot water from an innovative bio-mass boiler, initially fuelled by local wood. It fed water pipes into homes for access to cheap, 24-hour heating. But things went wrong when machinery was added with the idea of enabling the council to sell electricity produced by the system to the national grid.
The council later mothballed the “gasifier” plant, built for the purpose beside Pulteneytown Distillery, and sought to negotiate a contract with a private firm to look after the interests of consumers while continuing to underwrite the scheme.
The heating scheme is now powered by an oil-fired boiler and the costs have since mounted. It is understood that eight of the 10 officials involved have since left the council. While planning chairman Ian Ross insisted that “lessons had been learned” from the experience, a council statement issued after the meeting conceded that “governance arrangements should have been stronger”.
It added that “many improvement actions” had already been taken. The audit stated that potential future costs were “uncertain”, but that discussions were under way with two bidders who had registered an interest in taking over the district heating system.
New owners would be expected to fund, design, instal and operate new equipment required to connect into the existing pipe network. The bids will be evaluated by a council project team and its advisers who will report back to the company board.
http://www.pressandjournal.co.uk/Article.aspx/1558016/?UserKey=#ixzz0cUV34R6e
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