The latest from the new Labour Gov is that they are taking out the 2 clauses in NPPF (England) which required local community support and / or provision for Onshore Wind areas designated in local development plans. We’re not aware of any areas ever being designated for Onshore Wind in local plans, in England (there were in Wales). The formal withdrawal of local community support is significant and planning decisions in future on Onshore Wind will be treated like any other energy developments. But the local communities views will still be taken into account. We don’t know whether they will introduce some process to judge this (they said they would).
Reality is there were very few Onshore Wind proposals granted before these clauses were introduced in England (compared to Scotland). We suspect there won’t be many Onshore Wind proposals coming forward in England. Where they do arise they may well generate lots of controversy.
They’ve set a target of doubling Onshore Wind by 2030. That includes Scotland and is perhaps an indication of the attitude we may see of a Labour regime at Holyrood after 2026. i.e. continuing the present Scotland govt target of 20GW by 2030.
Perhaps more interesting, they are going to publish a ‘Community Benefit Protocol’ for Onshore Wind. Current community benefit level (£5k/MW) was set in 2012 and has never been updated. So we may see this rising. As you know paying community benefit is voluntary and not monitored. So we may see some more formal mechanism to say how it should be applied and a more stricter regime on its implementation. In time this might result in changes In Scotland.
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