the times | Friday August 28 2020 2GM 23
News
Storm Francis helped wind power gen-
erate its highest ever share of Britain’s
electricity needs in the early hours of
Wednesday.
Turbines produced almost 60 per
cent of power output as the storm blew
through with gusts of almost 80 mph.
The renewable energy record follows
Britain’s longest period without usage
from coal-fired power stations. Wind’s
Storm’s 80mph gusts generate a record for wind power
Callum Jones previous highest share of electricity
output was set during Storm Ellen last
weekend but the record was swiftly bro-
ken. The operator of the electricity grid
said wind generation has almost dou-
bled over recent years.
Between 1.30am and 2am on Wed-
nesday, wind accounted for 59.9 per
cent of electricity. Gas and nuclear sites
generated 18.8 per cent and 15 per cent
respectively. Coal contributed nothing.
Demand for energy has yet to return
from the low levels to which it fell dur-
ing the lockdown in March.
Roisin Quinn, head of national con-
trol at National Grid’s electricity
system operator, described Wednes-
day’s record as “incredible”, noting that
five years ago wind power contributed
an average 9 per cent to output.
“It’s already been a record-breaking
year for Britain’s electricity system,
with a 68-day coal-free run from spring
into summer, and May being the green-est month we’ve ever seen,” she said.
The coal-free stretch between April 10
and June 17 was the longest since the
first power plant fuelled by coal fired up
in 1882.
The amount of carbon dioxide pro-
duced for every kilowatt hour of electri-
city used also fell to its lowest monthly
level in May. High winds and low usage
of coal ensured that last winter was
Britain’s lowest for use of carbon on
record. “While our weather is the lead-ing factor in these trends and records,
they nevertheless underline the
progress we’re making towards being
able to operate the electricity system
entirely with zero carbon sources by
2025,” Ms Quinn said.
“A zero carbon grid is a stretching
target, but records like this show that
Great Britain’s grid is taking big strides
towards making it happen — and as a
country we’re leading the world in tran-
sitioning to net zero.”An American teenager with a
Wikipedia fixation is accused of
causing lasting damage to the Scots
language by writing false entries.
From the age of 12 the unnamed boy
created and edited tens of thousands of
pages for the Scots version of the online
encyclopedia, all of them written in a
nonsensical version of the language.
Almost a decade of work has resulted
in a database of more than 60,000
articles that function as one of the
language’s standard works.
Scots is a dialect of English that some
regard as a language in its own right. It
is distinct from Gaelic, a Celtic lan-
guage spoken mostly in the Highlands
and Islands.
As one of the few substantial online
resources that claims to be in Scots,
Wikipedia’s error-strewn pages are
used for translation and language ser-
vices offered by tech companies. A
Facebook tool lists Scots as one of the
rapidly when people realise that there is
an existential threat to human life and
if we took climate change as seriously as
this pandemic then we are surely cap-
able of making massive changes very,
very rapidly”.
The protests coincide with new laws
around gatherings from today. The
Home Office said this month: “Those
facilitating or organising illegal raves,
unlicensed music events, or any other
unlawful gathering of 30 people or
more may face a £10,000 fine.”
Paul Stephens, a former police officer
who supports XR, said the group had
received a letter from police outlining
restrictions and potential for fines “un-
less you are one of the exceptions”.
He described the letter as a “vague
threat” and said the group would be
challenging its contents in a meeting
with police yesterday.
Police said that Roger Hallam, 54,
from Wandsworth, southwest London,
an XR co-founder, and four others had
been charged with conspiracy to cause
criminal damage. They are due to
appear at Wood Green crown court
next month.Climate protesters prepare
bank holiday roadblocks
Tom BallWikipedia teenager wreaks
havoc upon Scots language
languages that it can process based on
Wikipedia.
The false entries were uncovered by
Ryan Dempsey, a Scots enthusiast from
Ballymena, Co Antrim. He described
the teenager’s activities as “cultural
vandalism on a hitherto unprecedented
scale”, adding: “Potentially tens of mil-
lions of people now think that Scots is a
horribly mangled rendering of English
rather than being a language or dialect
of its own, all because they were ex-
posed to a mangled rendering of Eng-
lish being called Scots by this person.”
The boy misused Scots words, deploy-
ing them seemingly at random in Eng-
lish sentences. The definition of village
says: “A veelage is a clustered human
settlement or community, larger than a
hamlet but smawer than a toun.”
Scots Wikipedia was founded by
native speakers but they drifted away. A
group of dedicated editors have helped
to keep it going despite not being native
speakers. Most have not edited any-
thing in Scots but have removed van-dalism. The teenager is believed to be
the author of 27,000 pages and respon-
sible for 100,000 edits.
A Wikipedia editor who knows him
said the boy knew only some self-taught
phrases but thought he was helping.
The editor, who requested anonymity,
said: “This is a travesty. He spent seven
years contributing to the project while
not knowing about the damage he was
doing. It isn’t his fault that no one was
around to tell him to stop.”
Wikimedia, the foundation which
oversees the Wiki brand, is considering
whether to delete Scots Wikipedia
entirely or undo only the boy’s work.
A post by the teenager reads: “Hon-
estly, I don’t mind if you revert all of my
edits, delete my articles, and ban me
from the wiki for good. I’ve already
found out that my ‘contributions’ have
angered countless people, and to me
that’s all the devastation I can be given.”
He added: “I don’t care about defend-
ing myself, I only want to stop being
harassed on my social medias.”Mike Wade
The environmental protest group
Extinction Rebellion plans to target
airports and impose roadblocks over
the bank holiday as it begins more
climate change demonstrations.
A “regional rebellion” is due to start
today with four days of protests planned
for cities including Bristol, Cardiff,
Leeds, London and Manchester.
Protesters are being encouraged to
take action locally because of Covid-19
and target the aviation sector, banks
and the fossil fuel industry.
Supporters of Extinction Rebellion
(XR), which advocates “non-violent
direct action” are being urged to protest
digitally, and phone their MPs and
“institutions of power”.
Anneka Sutcliffe, from XR Actions,
said that a “few thousand” people had
indicated on Facebook that they would
join in the London events but numbers
were expected to be lower than at dem-
onstrations held in October.
Clare Farrell, a co-founder of XR,
said that the Covid-19 crisis “has shown
us that things can change very, veryA
seal that
swam 15 miles
up the
waterways of
a national
park has been escorted
back to sea after getting
too friendly with people
on kayaks and paddle
boards (Charlie Parker).
The three-year-old
female, nicknamed Sally,
has been surprising
tourists on the Norfolk
Broads. People tried to
stroke her and some
jumped in to swim with
her at Womack Staithe,
near Ludham.
David Benbow, a shop
owner, said that the seal
had appeared on
Thursday last week after
swimming up the River
Bure and River Thurne.
“She just turned up out
of nowhere,” he said. “I
had never seen a seal so
far away from the sea.
She kept on hopping on
to paddleboards and
inflatable kayaks to see
what was going on, and
giving the impression
that she was tame and
gentle. One woman hadno idea she was there
and had quite a fright
when she turned round
and saw this seal on her
kayak. The look on her
face was priceless.”
Mr Benbow, 35,
became worried the seal
and her fans were at risk
so he and Terri Croft, 18,
a shop assistant, used
dead fish to lure her to
the back of their boat
before leading her
towards the sea onMonday. “Some
people were trying
to stroke her,” he
said. “Children
in dinghies were
interacting with
her and even
swimming with
her. We felt she
was becoming a
danger to the
public because
seals can easily bite
if you get too close to
them. She was also atrisk from the propellers
of boats.”
He learnt that Sally
was a three-year-old
female when he spotted
a tag from when she had
been rescued as a pup.
He took advice from the
wildlife charity Seal and
Shore Watch UK, who
told him how best to
help her back to the sea.
Mr Benbow waited for
the high spring tide on
Monday evening so that
Sally could be carried by
the fast-moving water as
she followed his boat.
He managed to get as far
as Stokesby on the Bure,
about seven miles from
the sea, before it grew
dark. “We hung back
and she continued
without us until we
lost sight of her,”
he said. “We
then headed
back to
Womack with
our navigation
lights on, feeling
sad as we will
miss her and her
antics, but very
happy that we had
achieved a successful
rescue ourselves.”Young seal
broadens
horizons
in Norfolk
The three-year-old seal,
nicknamed Sally, joined
people on boats and
paddleboards near
Ludham and will grace
a few holiday albumsgte
e to
oatabout seve
the sea, be
dark. “W
and sh
with
los
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th
b
W
o
lig
sa
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achieve
rescueouEAST ANGLIA NEWS SERVICE