The energy regulator has to reduce the costs of connecting to the national grid if Scotland's renewable wind energy revolution is to stay on course, campaigners have told The Times.

Environmentalists said the country must lead the way to ensure the UK continues to work towards its green energy targets throughout the economic downturn. And they claimed that to achieve this, the hefty charges levied on companies to connect to the national grid, particularly from the far north, must be deflated.

The warning came as the First Minister announced that a wind turbine manufacturing plant in the west of Scotland had been saved by a takeover. The Vestas wind turbine manufacturing plant near Campbeltown is being taken over by the subsidiary of another Danish firm, Skykon, which plans to expand the plant three-fold.

Alex Salmond brushed aside revelations in yesterday's Times that plans for windfarms across the UK were in disarray - and, along with them, the target to generate 35 per cent of Britain's electricity from wind by 2020 - because firms were pulling investment. The £35million private investment will be supplemented by a £9.2million Scottish Government grant and £500,000 in training support from Highlands and Islands Enterprise.

Mr Salmond said the Vestas takeover was being done with an eye to a "large and expanding" market for off-shore-and on-shore turbines. "Individual companies are going to take individual decisions," he added. "The bottom line is that within the next half-century we have the potential in Scotland to produce up to 60,000 megawatts of primarily off-shore renewable power."

Skykon chief executive Jesper Ohlenschlaeger said Scotland was "rapidly becoming the most positive and the most interesting renewable wind power market in Europe".

The British Wind Energy Association agreed the country would be essential to meeting the UK renewables target as Holyrood was concentrating on getting planning applications through more expeditiously. It said the economic downturn was forcing firms to think more carefully about where they were investing and warned that high charges to connect to the transmission network made this difficult.

Costs in the far north of Scotland are disproportionately high because the formula used prioritises population-dense areas. It does not take into account the fact that wind energy can only be generated in certain geographical areas. The charges are signed off by regulator Ofgem.

Jason Ormiston, chief executive of Scottish Renewables, told The Times: "If the regime is not fit for purpose when capital is global and can move around we will find technologies go elsewhere. The renewable capacity to have an effective response to climate change exists but transmission charging is holding us back and it needs to be resolved with some urgency. The industry is making an effort, but that is not always being backed by Ofgem."

A spokesman for the watchdog said that proposals for flat charges, put together by Scottish Renewables, Scottish Power, Scottish and Southern Energy and the Scottish Government, were currently with National Grid, which implements the methodology Ofgem has to approve. However, she said the watchdog had "no evidence that these [existing] charges are causing any impediment to renewable energy" and said it believed any problems related to planning.

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