Eigg Electric - Renewable Energy for the Isle of Eigg

Eigg Electric – the where, what and how of the Isle of Eigg’s renewable energy scheme, Eigg Electric.

Many thanks to Malcolm Baldwin and Iota Productions.

With no mainland electricity connection, and after decades of using diesel generators, the people of community-owned Isle of Eigg switched on their own renewable electricity supply in February 2008. In a unique system, wind, water and sun provide 24 hour power for the island’s 85 residents. This ten minute film tells you how it happens! See www.islandsgoinggreen.org for more information.

Source: IslandsGoingGreen.org

Electrification project

The next major project of the Heritage Trust was to enable the provision of a mains electricity grid, powered from renewable sources. Previously, the island was not served by mains electricity and individual crofthouses had wind, hydro or diesel generators and the aim of the project is to develop an electricity supply that is environmentally and economically sustainable.

The new system incorporates a 9.9 kWp PV system, three hydro generation systems (totalling 112 kW) and a 24 kW wind farm supported by stand-by diesel generation and batteries to guarantee continuous availability of power. A load management system has been installed to provide optimal use of the renewables. This combination of solar, wind and hydro power should provide a network that is self sufficient and powered 98% from renewable sources. The system was switched on, on 1 February 2008.^[10]

The Heritage Trust has formed a company, Eigg Electric Ltd, to operate the new a £1.6 million network, which has been part funded by the National Lottery and the Highlands and Islands Community Energy Company.^[11][12]

Source: Wikipedia

Islands Going Green – Eigg

Welcome to Eigg

In 1997, the Isle of Eigg made history when residents and their supporters achived their goal of a community buy-out.

Together, 3 partners forming the Isle of Eigg Heritage Trust, the Eigg Residents Association, the Highland Council and the Scottish Wildlife Trust are working to regenerate the island’s social, cultural and natural environment.

The building – An Laimhrig – was the first project completed by the Isle of Eigg Heritage Trust. Open on the first anniversary of the buy-out, it now provides a focus for community development around the pier area.

With 78 inhabitants and 11 children in its Primary School, Eigg has the largest population in the Small Isles.

In the 18th century, 500 people lived in 8 townships scattered around the island. Emigration, famine, clearances and two world wars have contributed to this dramatic reduction in numbers.

Through the security of tenure brought by the 1886 Crofters Act, the crofting way of life has prevented the complete depopulation of the island. Not only does crofting allow people to live on the land through a variety of activities, but its conservatio benefits are now recognised and encouraged. The corncrake is coming back to the hay-meadows, old methods of tillage are reintroduced and cattle are raised in the traditional way.

There are 13 crofts in Cleadale and Cuagach, the crofting townships at the North end of the island. Crofting production consists of cattle, hay, eggs and potatoes.

The island farms also produce sheep and cattle in conservation-friendly way. Grazing management is implemented to help the regeneration of the land and the preservation of the native environment.

Rich Cultural Tradition

A Wealth of Traditions

Music and song where an integral part of island life, alleviating the boredom of repetitive work, entertaining the community at the evening ceilidh.

Ishbel MacLeod was one of several island slingers at the turn of the century. She was recorded by Marjorie Kennedy-Fraser for her “Songs of the Hebrides” in 1902. MEM Donaldson, Scottish Ethnographic Archive

Island lore and genealogy was handed down by gifted tradition bearers, such as Hugh MacKinnon, the “best historian of his generation” or Duncan Fergusonm the islands fiddler.

Photo: Island of Eigg Archive

Feis Eige

Today the community of Eigg plays its part in the Gaelic cultural renaissance: the annual Feis Eige, on the 2nd week-end in July, offers children and adults tuition in traditional music and dance.

Photo: trad dancer Island of Eigg Archive

A Landscape Steeped in History

8000 years of human occupation have left their mark on the islands landscape. Archeological remains abound, from burial mounds and Iron Age forts to ancient stones crosses.

Photo: Iron Age Dun, Eigg Pier RCAHMAS

For 440 years, the island remained in the hand of the MacDonalds of Clandranald and was farmed by tacksmen belonging to that powerful clan. Shieldings in the hills, 18th century farmhouses, runrigs and ancient steadings date back to that period.

Clanrandald Armorial Panel, Kildonnan Chapel

The characteristic undulations of former lazy-beds mark every slope. As an intensive method of tillage, these were very successful in an uncompromising climate: raised beds facilitated drainage, crops were planted on sea-weed and the soil turned over with the Cas Chrom, the Gaelic footplough.

Making Lazy beds, Photo: Scottish Ethnographic Archive

Galmidisdale Farm c1890, Photo RCAHMS

Higher in the hills, old peatbeds can also be outline, which where harvested for fuels for many centuries

A Troubled History

Pictish Saint and Pagan Queen

St Donnan, a Pictish saint, bought Christianity to Eigg in the early 7th century, founding a monastry at Kildonan. He was matryred there with his 52 companions in 617, allegedly by the warrior woman of the pagan Queen of the Moidart, who gave their name to Loch nam Ban Mora, the loch of the Big Woman, beneath the Sgurr.

7th Century Cross, Kildonnan Chapel, RCAHMS

Norse Invaders

Following Viking raiders, Norse invaders settled on Eigg from the 8th century, thriving as piratical farmer-raiders. They gave the island most of its place names and contributed to the foundation of the independent Norse-Irish kingdom in the Hebrides which became the Lordship of the Isles.

Image: Norse Sword-handle from the Viking burial mound at the Kildonnan

Clan Fueds

In the early 16th century, 395 macDonald clansmen – the whole island population – were suffocated to death in the cave of Uamh Fhraing by a party of MacLeods from whose avenging raid they had taken refuge. This was one of the bloodiest episodes of the fued which opposed the two clans in territorial struggles which followed the fall of the Lordship of the Isles.

The island was soon repopulated but the islanders suffered an second massacre in 1588, when MacLean of Duart raided and pillaged the Small Isles with the help of one hundre soldiers from the Spanish Armada.

1745 and its aftermath

The islanders rose in the Jacobite rebellions of 1715 and 1745 and paid a heavy price for it: in 1745, the 38 islanders who had survived Culloden were taken prisoner by the Navy and transported to the West Indies. The destruction of the clan system had started.

The water mill built by the chief of Clanranald represents a first attempt to introduce a cash economy on the island after Culloden. On the chief’s order, the islanders’ quern stones were broken so that they had to bring their oats to be ground at the mill.

Tacksmen’s rents were increased so that they had to export ever larger quantaties of kelp for the chiefs ever greater profit. Kelp, an alkali used in the manufacture of glass, linen and gun-powder, was produced by burning the seaweed harvested by the small tenantry. They were no longer allowed to manure their fields.

Crofts and Clearances

Kelp profits caused massive several island farms to be divided into crofts, strips of land which were too small to allow tenantes to pay their rent without working the kelp. The first crofts were laid in Cleadale in 1810.

When the kelp trade collapsed in the 1820s sheep became the new source of profits, requiring much less manpower.

As more and more land was put under sheep, impoverished crofters were first assisted to emigrate. The came the Clearances: in 1853, 14 families in Upper and Lower Grulin were evicted and sent to Canada.

The Island as a Sporting Estate

In Victorian and Edwardian times, the island was developed as a sporting estate, with forestry planted to shelter game and the crofters of Galmisdale relocated to the North end of the island. Although the threat of eviction was finally removed by the Crofters Act of 1886, the island population never recovered from the mass emigration during that period.

Donald-Archie MacLeod, the Estate game-keeper, 1920, Photo Isle of Eigg Archive

Sir Walter Runciman, shipping magnate and cabinet minister, was the last of the island sporting owners, reputed to have shot 300 woodcocks in one afternoon. The Lodge, set in an exotic garden modellled on Poolewe, was built in the 1920′s as his country retreat.

The Lodge and the Gardens photo

Community Regeneration

In 1995 the islanders started their determined campaign to achieve a community buy-out, following the success of the Assynt crofters. Two years later, the victory of the Isle of Eigg Heritage Trust in the securing the right for the island community to have a say in its own future, was hailed as a victory for all rural communities in Scotland as well as for Land Reform.

Looking to the Future

The Isle of Eigg Heritage Trust is now placing community development as the essential foundation for long-term sustainability on the island. This needs time, understanding and recognition. By making a donation to the Trust or joining Cairdean Eige, the Friends of Eigg, you too can help the Trust in its Task.

Contact: 01687 482486 or http://www.isleofeigg.org