The million pound idea: 20 years on

It's 20 years since a former new age traveller called Dale Vince noticed that a hill near a Gloucestershire village was unusually windy.

It gave him the idea that turned him into a millionaire.

Living in a caravan - he saw the opportunity to put up a wind turbine machine.

Dale Vince founded the Ecotricity company - which specialises in selling green energy.

The project wasn't without controversy. Local people demonstrated against the plans, claiming that the windmill would have an adverse effect on house prices and be an ugly white elephant:

Now, the company employs 800 people.

Dale owns a football club and captured a British land speed record with a specially built electric car, the Nemesis - powered by wind.

The flaw in generating electricity this way is that when the air is still, typically during cold frosty periods, there's no wind.

But now Dale now has plans for supplying the country with alternative energy, from a machine which digests grass and turns it into gas.

So, 20 years on, does he regard his wind turbine as a beauty?

Here's the full report: