New Offshore Wind Areas Designated Off Kintyre

[jowett63]

Marine Scotland has just released its scoping study for the next round of areas that are leasable for development for offshore wind - or in their words "strategic search areas of relatively low constraint on development".

The full report is here: http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications ... 28104658/0 but the map that sums it up for our area is here http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications ... #figtwelve .

As you will see there two main implications for Kintyre -

A whole new area south of Islay designated W6, which they say is "An area of low constraint is identified immediately south of Islay. This area has not been included in either the short or medium options in the current offshore plan, and may present an opportunity for development, and for integration with other potential development sites west of Scotland."

The other is a considerable expansion of the already designated area W4 south of the Mull, of which they say " the current scoping study suggests that the boundaries of this area could be reviewed to incorporate areas of low and low to moderate constraint south and southwest of W4".

This study is really just flagging up areas that Marine scotland believe are the most ripe for future exploration/exploitation and they say "The next stage in the extension of the Plan for Offshore Wind Energy out from territorial waters to cover all Scottish marine waters is therefore to address each of the potential development areas in more detail through a Regional Locational Guidance process.".

So we await the snappily entitled Regional Location Guidance process with bated breath.....the folk of the Mull and southern Islay and Arran most especially.