Assessing the Impacts of Wind Farms on Blanket Peatland
This project involved developing guidance for Natural England to aid in the assessment of proposals for wind farms on blanket peatland. Blanket Bog is a Biodiversity Action Plan (BAP) habitat and forms a large terrestrial carbon store in the UK.
Many existing and planned wind farms in the North of England are located on areas supporting blanket bog habitat, or dominated by blanket peat. Assessing the impact of wind farms on blanket bog is essential, given the importance of peatland habitats as a nature conservation resource, and their sensitivity to development pressures.
There were several outputs to the study:
- » A comprehensive literature review to fully assess the current state of knowledge surrounding blanket bog, wind farms and planning.
- » A series of comparative case studies to assess the accuracy of predicted impacts and to draw practical lessons.s
- » Prepared the landscape and visual impact assessment
- » Development of a set of assessment criteria for Natural England staff against which proposed developments can be assessed to determine the likely scale of impact and enable an appropriate response to an Environmental Impact Assessment.
- » Development of recommendations for good practice for developers and local authorities. The outputs should help focus environmental impact assessments on the particular sensitivities of blanket bog and enable impacts of wind farms to be minimised
