Inspiration

With the ambitious goal of planting one million native trees by 2030, a woodland initiative on the Isle of Lewis is driving reforestation efforts in the Hebrides. The local community is utilising vacant or underused crofts to cultivate a flourishing network of woods. Many of these saplings are sourced from seeds collected by the Hebridean Tree Ark, which gathers them from native trees growing in remote locations, inaccessible to red deer and sheep that hinder natural regeneration.

The initiative is primarily funded by Beinn Ghrideag, the UK’s largest community wind farm, located on the island. Owned by the Point and Sandwick Trust, a community-led organisation, the wind farm generates an annual profit of £900,000 for the local community. This form of community ownership allows profits from the energy production to be captured and then reinvested locally.

Typically, rural communities feel excluded from the profits generated by large multi-national energy firms and resent the large turbines built in their local areas. Calum Macdonald, the former Labour MP leading the woodland project, hopes it can be a model for community owned energy projects across the UK.