Yet the switch to green energy comes with trade-offs, not least the impact on the archipelago’s previously unspoilt landscapes. It has left some residents feeling powerless in the face of seemingly unstoppable developments.

“People are opening their back door, or their curtains, and are faced with masses of turbines,” says Buchan, a fish farm technician and photographer who has spent years picturing the local environment.

“It’s a beautiful valley and this has ruined the view.”

Supporters of these projects say the prosperous life islanders are used to – well-kept public services, near-full employment and even Christmas bonuses for pensioners at one stage – can only continue if they embrace green energy opportunities.

“This is about employment, it’s about our own energy transition and trying to figure out how we can be more efficient as a society,” says Douglas Irvine, head of future energy at Shetland Islands Council.

The local authority is pushing ahead with plans to transform the archipelago into a renewable energy powerhouse. Officials are also trying to ensure islanders benefit from hosting the infrastructure.

For example, despite Shetland’s status as a major oil and gas hub since the 1970s, the islands lack a gas network and a large proportion of households languish in fuel poverty.

“We’ve had over eight billion barrels of oil processed here, and it’s made a huge contribution to the UK Exchequer, but we still face the highest fuel bills anywhere,” explains Irvine. “This is an opportunity to change that.”

Yet in the case of Viking, which was developed by Scottish and Southern Electricity (SSE), transition has proved far from straightforward. Islanders have clashed bitterly over both its environmental impact and the project’s perceived benefit to the rest of Britain, rather than locals.

Construction involved digging deep concrete foundations into previously untouched peatland and building new access roads, with the resulting turbines dominating the views from nearby homes.

The project’s size and capacity of 443 megawatts – enough to power 500,000 homes per year, dwarfing the 10,600 on the Shetlands themselves – has also rankled, because it means most of the electricity generated will be exported via a subsea interconnector to mainland Scotland.