Walshaw Moor: Move to halt wind farm on moor which inspired Wuthering Heights

The Stronger Together coalition, made up of six organisations, is calling on the Government to halt proposals for a 300MW farm they say threatens internationally important habitats and a “globally significant” cultural landscape.

Walshaw Moor is designated as a Special Area of Conservation and a Special Protection Area due to its rare peatland habitat and red-listed bird species, including curlews, lapwings, skylarks, merlins, and golden plovers.

Despite its legal protections, the Saudi-backed developers are pushing ahead with plans to build 41 wind turbines – at 200m more than 40m higher than the Blackpool Tower – and a battery energy storage system on the moors surrounding Top Withens, the ruined farmhouse said to have inspired the novel by Emily Brontë.

The area continues to attract global literary tourism and is currently the focus of a community-led effort to secure Unesco World Heritage Site status.

A member of the Friends of Brontë Country said: “Destroying this unique moorland would not only be an ecological disaster — it would be a cultural tragedy.

“This is one of the last places in the world where you can step into the pages of a novel like Wuthering Heights and still find the landscape intact.”

People are being urged to sign a petition on the parliament.uk website for a ban on wind farm development on protected peatland, which has already gained nearly 15,000 signatures.

The campaign is also seeking support for amendments to the Planning and Infrastructure Bill to strengthen protections for peatland in England.

As the UK seeks to meet its renewable energy targets, campaigners emphasise that climate action must not come at the cost of irreplaceable habitats and heritage.

“We are not anti-renewables,” said the spokesperson. “But we must place wind farms in appropriate locations — not on vital peat bogs that store carbon and support rare wildlife.”

The developers have cut the farm from 65 turbines to the current 41. They say it will provide “homegrown, clean power” which “will boost Britain’s energy independence, save money on energy bills, support highly skilled jobs and tackle the climate crisis”.

There is a 30-year history of wind farm proposals for moorland above the upper Calder Valley and through the 1990s some projects were bitterly opposed.