£11.5m of public cash lost in community heat scheme collapse
THE failure of a Highland Council district heating scheme designed to meet the authority’s renewable targets has cost the taxpayer £11.5 million.
A report by Audit Scotland blames a lack of governance which resulted in the demise of Caithness Heat and Power (CHaP) which provided heat and hot water to 246 customers in Wick.
In 2002, the authority aimed to deliver an innovative heating system in the town as part of its commitment to supporting renewable energy and tackling fuel poverty, with the scheme up and running in 2004 .
But the project ran into severe financial and technical issues and was scrapped in 2008, when the Highland Council took over responsibility from the company it had established to oversee the scheme.
The council failed in its attempts to agree terms with new bidders to take over the scheme and scrapped the project in 2011, selling its equipment in an auction to Ignis Energy Ltd, who restarted its own private heating scheme in Wick in May 2012.
Audit Scotland said as a result of the council’s own actions and the lack of good governance, the authority failed to secure value for money from the substantial amount of public money spent on the project.
Read more in Friday’s John O’Groat Journal.