The renewables revolution, said the First Minister, is only beginning. Alex Salmond yesterday announced that his government has given the go-ahead for the biggest wind farm in Europe.

The renewables revolution, said the First Minister, is only beginning. Alex Salmond yesterday announced that his government has given the go-ahead for the biggest wind farm in Europe, several clusters of turbines, 152 in total, along the M74 as it winds its way through the southern uplands. There is also, he said, more to come.

Scottish Government officials are currently reviewing another 26 major wind farms, as well as nine new hydro-electric schemes and a proposed tidal power plant. Their total potential installed capacity: 2.5 gigawatts. Protesters across Scotland are gearing up for years of fights to save what they see as beloved hillsides or moors. They are, it seems, going to lose a lot of battles.

The latest development, at Abington in South Lanarkshire, horrified some campaigners. "The M74 is the way most people - and most tourists - drive into Scotland from England," said Gillian Bishop of Views of Scotland, an anti-wind farm group. "Some are going to turn round and go home because all they are going to see is turbine after turbine."

Some locals were upset too. A group opposing the plans was formed and a march across the affected hillsides organised, led by television personality and botanist David Bellamy.

South Lanarkshire Council opposed the project, albeit then envisaged to be slightly bigger than the plan approved by Scottish ministers yesterday.

Not everybody, however, was against the plans. Some farmers, like most in Scotland struggling to balance the books with high prices for fuel, feed and fertiliser and low prices for their produce, saw opportunities to sell land for turbines. Others were enticed by the prospects of jobs, 200 during a three-year construction phase, and another 30 permanent posts when the wind farm is fully operation.

"The reaction has been fairly mixed," said Beith Forrest, the Conservative who has represented the area on South Lanarkshire Council for 20 years. "Personally, I would say I have accepted the plans. Never at any stage did I say Over my dead body'. I have been in the game too long for that. There are, after all, going to be benefits, and not just jobs."

Developers - now Scottish and Southern Energy - will be expected to put something back into the community. A figure of £500,000 has been mooted. Local community groups are licking their lips at the prospect of grants that would otherwise be impossible to obtain. But what about the long-term damage to one of the area's main industries, tourism?

"People will get used to the turbines," said Hamish Stewart, another Tory councillor representing the area who admits to some concerns that the development will put off holidaymakers. "They become part of the landscape."

Mr Forrest will see some 26 of them from his own home. But, because of the way the Clyde valley twists its way through the hills, nobody will ever be able to see the whole development, even if it will go by the grand title of Europe's biggest.

Consent for the project was yesterday welcomed by environmental groups, not least because it is being built next to a motorway rather than, like the rejected Lewis project, vulnerable nesting sites. Scotland, after all, is now on track to tear ahead of the rest of Europe in meeting green energy targets. The government has committed itself to meeting 31% of electricity demand from renewable sources by 2011 and 50% by 2020.

Good, but not good enough said Richard Dixon, director of WWF Scotland. Scotland, he said, needs to cut emissions of greenhouse gases as well as adding renewable capacity. "To effectively deliver cuts in pollution efforts to increase the use of renewable energy must run beside a strong Scottish Climate Change Bill. "If Scotland is to achieve the 80% cuts in emissions by 2050, which the government is aspiring to, the bill will need to include statutory reduction targets of at least 3% year on year and cover pollution from aviation and shipping.

"The Clyde wind farm is a good proposal because it is close to major centres of population, who will use the power it generates, and away from Scotland's most valuable landscapes. Scotland needs more of this sort of large, central belt wind farm to help us move quickly to clean, green energy."