Proposed Moorhouse Farmers Windfarm - Renfrewshire Council

Pre-Application Consultation Report
1 INTRODUCTION TO THE PRE-APPLICATION (PAC) REPORT
1.1 INTRODUCTION
This pre-application consultation (PAC) report has been prepared by Natural
Capital Ltd to explain the consultation process that has been undertaken to inform
the proposals for the development of a 19 turbine Moorhouse Farmers Windfarm
near Eaglesham, Scotland.
The proposals are being taken forward by Coriolis Energy LLP 1 on behalf of Falck
Renewables 2 .
This PAC will be submitted to East Renfrewshire Council (ERC) at the same time
as the planning application and Environmental Statement (ES) for the proposals.
1.2 PAC CONTEXT
Effective management of stakeholder expectations and of the consultation process
is of prime importance to the successful progression and delivery of any
development proposals.
The importance of successful consultation has been recently strengthened with
the Planning etc. (Scotland) Act 2006 3 and related legislation and by the
publication of best practice guidance set out in PAN 81: Community Engagement 4
and other relevant guidance documents.
Statutory requirements for PAC are set out in the Town and Country Planning
(Development Management Procedure (Scotland) Regulations 2008 and the
relevant provisions of the Town and Country Planning (Scotland) Act 1997 as
amended by the Planning etc. (Scotland) Act 2006. Scottish Government (2009)
Scottish Planning Series Circular 4 2009: Development Management
Procedures offers further guidance on PAC procedures.
The purpose of PAC is to ensure communities can comment on proposals early on
in the planning process. This will improve applications, help ensure negative
impacts are mitigated where feasible and help address misunderstandings.
All national and major developments require PAC between developers and
communities. These categories are defined in the Town and Country Planning
(Hierarchy of Developments) (Scotland) Regulations 2009. A major development
includes ‘Electricity Generation: construction of an electricity generating station -
the capacity of the generating station is or exceeds 20 megawatts’.
The proposed Moorhouse Farmers Windfarm has an approximate 47.5 Megawatt
(MW) capacity which means it is classed within the ‘major’ category and is
therefore subject to PAC.
1.3 PURPOSE OF THE PAC REPORT
The purpose of the PAC Report is:
to outline the PAC process which has taken place on this project;
1 Available: http://www.coriolis-energy.com
2 Available: http://www.falckrenewables.com
3 HMSO (2006) Planning etc. (Scotland) Act 2006
4 Scottish Government (2007) Planning Advice Note (PAN) 81: Community Engagement – Planning with People
Natural Capital Ltd 1 Falck Renewables