Wind leading the way in the rebirth of British manufacturing

In amongst all the economic doom & gloom, there's a couple of announcements you might have missed. It would appear that Britain may be on the cusp of a new era in industry. Both Mitsubushi & Gamesa, the Spanish wind turbine company, are looking to invest in UK manufacturing, following the announcement that licences for enormous offshore wind farms have been granted by the Government.

Lord Mandleson announced that Mitsubushi has committed just under 100 million in investment to build a new wind turbine research centre in the North East, to study how to construct the world's biggest blades. The centre will create up to 200 new jobs over the next few years, potentially growing to 1,500 in the future. The Government has announced grants of up to 30m to support it.

Gamesa has confirmed that its in talks with the Government to build a new wind turbine factory in the UK, potentially in partnership with the German firm Bard.

This may yet lead to the rebirth of British manufacturing - the new offshore fields have the potential to generate up to 70,000 jobs by 2020. However, when making the Mitsubushi announcement, Lord Mandelson made a very important point.

He said: "No country makes offshore wind turbines of the size we are talking about today on a commercial scale.

"Twenty years ago the UK was a leading centre for onshore wind technology, but we failed to capitalise on that by not providing the right climate for growth.

"We are determined not to let that happen again. We are creating the largest market in the world for offshore wind and we intend to build and support the industry."

The story of how Britain led the world in developing wind power technology only to lose it through lack of Government support back in the 70s and 80s is one of missed opportunity; a story that wasn't repeated elsewhere.

In the mid 70s, the US government worked closely with developers to advance technology to make large commercial wind turbines. This Government-supported research and development programme helped to pioneer many of the multi-megawatt turbine technologies that we still use today.It led to the US having the largest number of wind turbines in the world - most built and provided by US companies. Government investment in developing industries is vital to get them off their feet to the point where they can compete on the world stage.

But that's not all they need. Glance at the top 10 wind turbine manufacturers in the world, and you'll find that half of them are German. It's no coincidence that Germany also has the second highest number of windfarms on the planet. If you have a strong domestic market for your product, national businesses thrive.

So to create a successful renewable industry, were going to need two things. Firstly, we'll need Government support - both financial and political. Secondly, we'll need local support to approve more onshore wind farms the offshore fields wont provide enough demand.

As we've highlighted before, last year only 25% of planning applications for onshore windfarms were approved at the first opportunity - the lowest ever figure.

Here, the Tories are taking the lead. Theyre proposing that local communities should keep their business rates for six years if they accept a wind farm development in their area.

This sort of approach is vital - beyond anything else, people in the area around a wind farm must feel that they're getting something out of it. Expanding renewable energy in the UK is vital both to stimulate our manufacturing industry and combat climate change, but imposing the solution on rural communities without asking them what they'd like to get out of it will only foster resentment. It's encouraging to see that politicians are recognising that.

These announcements, coupled with the renewed political will behind renewables represent a great step forward, but there's still much more to achieve - for which we'll need to work together.