Three organisations from across the energy and planning sectors have come together to examine how the UK’s renewable energy planning system could be improved to hit renewable energy capacity targets.
Trade body RenewableUK, countryside charity CPRE and sustainable business organisation Aldersgate Group have released the interim findings of their investigation into the UK’s onshore renewable energy planning system, in a report titled Insights for the decarbonised electricity system: journeys through planning.
The report, which focuses on Nationally Significant Infrastructure Projects (NSIPs), examines the successes and failures of the planning system from the point of view of three kinds of user: energy developers, local communities, and the environment, which was labelled as a “user” of the planning system given the requirements for environmental consideration within these processes.
This stage of the investigation identified five major issues with the current NSIP regime. These are the lack of strategic plans, joined-up policy and public engagement, resourcing challenges across the system, difficulties in efficiently sourcing adequate data, inherent uncertainties in the process that exacerbate other issues, and the need for complex trade-offs to balance conflicting interests.
As such, the report’s authors have made several early recommendations for improving the system. They urge the government to involve planning experts, communities, environmental groups, and infrastructure developers in developing upcoming policy changes and note that the government should invest in capacity building.
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