Eden Valley initiatives include a campaign to get people to buy locally, moves to supply fast broadband services to rural areas and a hydro-power scheme for the River Eden.

BBC: Volunteers speak up for Big Society

Many people in Totnes bought shares in the community scheme which was designed to provide power for 2, 500 households.

BBC: Planners reject Totnes wind turbines proposal

Mr Simplot himself, an avowed lover of skiing, duck shooting and the great outdoors, was attacked in the 1970s for his support for new coal-fired electricity plants along the Snake river and for a scheme to generate hydro-power by diverting water from another river into a vast underground tube.

ECONOMIST: Jack Simplot

The scheme includes one kilometre of embankment and provides flood protection for Keadby Power Station, three sewage treatment works, two railway lines and three stations, the A614, the A616 and the M18 motorway.

BBC: Largest flood scheme in Yorkshire completed

The scheme has also attracted interest as a possible long-term power source for a manned mission to Mars.

ECONOMIST: Nuclear power

Faced with the choice of setting tighter limits on Congressional power or upholding a national scheme of drug-enforcement laws, Scalia voted for law enforcement.

FORBES: Obamacare's Fate Hangs With Roberts, Not Kennedy

Plans for the energy scheme were first put forward four years ago by Marine Current Turbines (MCT) and the power company RWE nPower.

BBC: ?70m tidal power scheme off Anglesey wins approval

The early release scheme has been one of the most criticised aspects of the peace accord which paved the way for the establishment of a power-sharing executive in Northern Ireland.

BBC: News Online