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Unlocking Consents

The study ‘Barriers to Commissioning Renewable Energy Projects’ was commissioned in June 2005. The study has collated evidence regarding the nature and scale of the post-planning approval delays.  The report established the current position, likely future trends and recommended actions to speed up progress.   It focused on barriers to commissioning onshore wind projects, however, it also addressed offshore wind, biomass and hydro projects.The Group  commissioned a project which is looked at post-consent barriers to projects.  The project is now complete and a presentation on the report and the way forward was discussed at RAB on 15 December 2005.

The analysis discovered that there are a number of factors leading to delays in the post approval phase of renewable energy schemes that are unlikely to improve without some form of intervention.  The time taken to commission renewable energy schemes, following planning approval, is lengthening.  A number of recommendations have been proposed to:

• Assist current approved schemes towards construction and commissioning;
• Speed up the process for future approved schemes;

The report proposed 12 recommendations.  An action plan to address the issues has been produced (RAB_2006_0005).  A number of the recommendations are already being pursued, however, work will be commenced, and if appropriate additional studies will be commissioned, as soon as possible, on the following recommendations:

Recommendation 1 - Landowner negotiations & connection Wayleave Rights
The Law Society have been asked if they can facilitate this recommendation and progress will be reported to RAB in due course.

Recommendations 7&8 - Post approval decision making by determining authorities - Negotiating planning agreements and agreeing and discharging conditions.

This is an area of focus for the BERR's Renewable Deployment Team. A BERR funded study has collected and assessed a representative selection of planning conditions issued by regulatory bodies for wind energy schemes. The study will be used to inform next steps on implementing Recommendations 7&8.

• Landowner easement and way-leave issues

• Grid issues

• Supply chain capability evaluation and support

• Contracting structure developments

• Planning condition guidance and timescales

• Resources for planning across all layers of Government

• Highlighting causes of delay to developers

• Project economics and support for biomass

Further discussions to prioritise the recommendations and decide which ones to progress have been developed by a cross Department group, which will has produced an action plan to address the issues.

Objectives and work plans are for the remainder of 2006.

BERR working closely with RAB, Trade Associations and other stakeholders will take a number of the recommendations forward.  This will form a part of BERR's work plan for the coming financial year, and the Working Group will act as a sounding board for future developments rather than pursue its own programme of activity.
In the remainder of 2006, the following activities will be progressed:

• BERR is producing - working closely with the Devolved Administrations and ODPM- a good practice guide to setting planning conditions and managing expectations of developers with a target audience of Local Planning Authorities, Planning Control Officers and Wind energy developers.
• Defra will progressively assess data from Round 1 monitoring as it becomes available in order to develop its use of appropriate and proportionate monitoring conditions.  In addition, Defra are considering when sufficient data from round 1 monitoring will be available to undertake an overarching review of monitoring conditions. 
• BERR and Defra will be looking to help developers continue the trend that is already emerging of working to relatively uniform predictions of environmental impacts from different projects.
• Defra will continue to consider requests for modification of existing FEPA licence conditions on the basis of the provision of supporting site-specific data. It is hoped that the need for modifications will reduce as applicants' expectations of technical delivery (e.g. on cable burial depth) become increasingly reliable.
• BERR and Defra will continue with their jointly funded programme of research studies into impacts of offshore windfarms, making this information available to developers to help reduce the uncertainties surrounding their applications.
• BERR and Defra will liaise with COWRIE who are undertaking a major programme of work on data management in relation to offshore windfarms.
  
  Membership
  BERR Representative: Katherine Watson
  Industry member: Jason Scagell