Planning reforms promote renewables projects in England

Gareth Phillips of Pinsent Masons, who specialises in renewables projects, was commenting after the UK government published the revised National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF) (82-page / 847KB PDF) on Thursday, along with a related paper that confirmed when proposed new renewables projects will be subject to a special consenting process reserved for ‘nationally significant infrastructure projects’ (NSIPs) in England.

The government has set the minimum generation capacity that solar projects have to meet to be in-scope of the NSIPs consenting regime at 100MW, rather than the 150MW it initially proposed, and made clear onshore wind is also a renewables technology capable of being an NSIP after earlier this year lifting the de facto ban on onshore wind development that had applied since 2015. The NSIP capacity threshold for onshore wind projects has also been set at 100MW. The Planning Act 2008 will need to be amended in order for these changes to come into effect – the government intends to bring forward that legislation in spring 2025, and further detail is awaited regarding proposed transitional arrangements for projects that are already in the pre-application process until the end of 2025.

A development consent order needs to be obtained from the secretary of state before NSIPs can go ahead. National policy statements (NPSs) have been issued that outline the requirements applicants for NSIPs must meet and the factors decision makers must weigh when considering those applications. A raft of energy NPSs, updated earlier this year under the previous government, are in place to account for different types of energy technologies. The government has indicated, in its separate new clean power 2030 action plan, that the energy NPSs are being reviewed and will be updated again in 2025.

In relation to onshore wind, Phillips welcomed the end of the effective moratorium on onshore wind and the reinstatement of the technology to the Planning Act 2008, but he does not believe it will lead to “the floodgates opening” in terms of onshore wind NSIPs.

Solar and onshore wind projects with generation capacity under the 100MW threshold will fall subject to local planning authority (LPA) decision-making, which is shaped by the NPPF.

While the government stepped back from setting a stronger expectation that LPAs identify sites for renewable and low carbon energy in their local plans, following industry concerns about its potential impact on plan delivery, the updated NPPF explicitly provides that the planning system should help to “support renewable and low carbon energy and associated infrastructure”. It will remain discretionary as to whether LPAs make provision for renewable and low carbon energy in their local plans.

While Phillips acknowledged that there is some industry criticism that the revised NPPF could have gone further to reflect the policy shift towards promoting renewable energy infrastructure provided for in the updated energy NPSs earlier this year, he welcomed the reforms as providing more encouragement to prospective developers of low carbon infrastructure.

“The change in threshold could mean we see more planning applications for solar projects up to 100MW, which arguably have fallen in the planning ‘dead zone’ previously, because it was not cost effective to promote them under the NSIP regime,” Phillips said. “Whether those planning applications achieve consent from local planning authorities has been the subject of much debate. Given many LPAs have found it politically difficult to grant planning permission for solar projects around 49MW, due to constituents’ concerns over landscape and visual impact and loss of agricultural land, they may well struggle to consent projects up to twice that size and capacity. If so, we will see more planning appeals for that scale of solar project.”

“The good news is that other changes to the NPPF have removed potential ‘blockers’ to solar projects; have not introduced new or more onerous policy tests in relation to best and most versatile agricultural land; and require the ‘planning system’, which includes LPAs, to ‘support renewable and low carbon energy and associated infrastructure’. This is all positive and brings the NPPF more closely aligned with the NPSs for energy designated in January 2024,” he said.

However, Phillips added: “Even with the positive changes to the NPPF, when promoting solar and onshore wind under 100MW capacity, I expect developers to have more success on appeal, than with LPAs.”