ScottishPower Renewables' final phase of pre-application consultation for the East Anglia TWO and East Anglia ONE North Offshore Windfarms finished in March 2019. Since then we have been reviewing feedback and have worked closely with the local authorities and statutory stakeholders to refine our proposals.
Engaging with the local community is important to us and provides valuable insight to inform the development of our plans. We are pleased to share updates to our proposals following this engagement here. At this time we cannot provide any further detail or information, however this will be provided in the submission documentation that is currently being prepared. The next point at which documents will be made publicly available will be following acceptance of the applications by the Planning Inspectorate, expected to be in late 2019.
You can find full details including plans and figures in this Developing our Plans document.
Proposed Development Area
Further refinement of the red line boundary has taken place to:
- Avoid some residential properties.
- Further limit impact on farmland.
- Avoid areas of archaeological interest as much as practicable. Where avoidance has not been possible the order limits have been left deliberately broad to allow flexibility of micro-siting around these during construction.
- Maximised distance of red line boundary from the Sandlings Special Protection Area (SPA) to minimise impact and disturbance on this European protected site.
Construction Timings
- Seeking to reduce Saturday working hours from 7am to 7pm to 7am to 1pm.
- Reduce the construction programme at the landfall (Thorpeness) from 20 to 12 months.
Substation Visual Landscape
Protecting the visual landscape around the substation site was a commonly raised theme, therefore we have:
- Enhanced planting and screening - the Landscape Management Plan presents a comprehensive planting scheme to help further screen the substation using native species. This will also help to improve ecological diversity, by creating wildlife corridors between new and existing woodland belts and additional habitats.
- The plan will also incorporate areas designated for early planting and public footpaths.
Traffic and Transport
- Landfall access route – we are no longer proposing to use Thorpeness Road to access the Landfall area during construction, removing all HGV traffic from the Thorpeness Road. All vehicle access to the Landfall during construction will be via Sizewell Gap, a designated ‘zone distributor route’ identified as suitable for HGVs under Suffolk County Council’s Lorry Route Network.
- This in turn means a significant reduction in the number of HGVs using the roundabout and Leiston Road. The total daily two-way HGV movements (i.e. arrivals and departures) are therefore reduced from 55 HGV to 10 HGVs at the peak period.
- Aldeburgh Roundabout - the removal of Thorpeness Road as a vehicle access route allows for the removal of the Aldeburgh roundabout at Saxmundham Road/Leiston Road from our plans.
Construction Consolidation Sites
- Significant reductions of the CCS compounds within the development area, including the reduction in size and the removal of the compound east of Snape Road, resulting in the cumulative footprint of the CCSs for both projects being reduced by around 60%.
- This will also reduce the traffic requirements to construct and reinstate each CCS.
Offshore Visual Impact
- Adapted the offshore development area for East Anglia TWO. This will create a gap between East Anglia TWO and ONE North to break up the visual impact of turbines alongside each other and neighbouring developments.
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Further updates on the development of our plans will be announced over the coming months.
We would again like to thank all those who took part in our Phase 4 Consultation on the proposed East Anglia TWO and East Anglia ONE North Offshore Windfarms.