1.1.1. This background paper provides information on the identification of opportunity areas for the Dorset Council Local Plan options consultation 2025.
2.1.1. National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF) (Paragraph 161) sets out the planning system should support the transition to net zero by 2050 including through supporting renewable and low carbon energy and associated infrastructure.
2.1.2. Under paragraph 165 of the NPPF Plans should help to increase the use and supply of renewable and low carbon energy by providing a positive strategy for energy from these sources, whilst ensuring that adverse impacts are addressed appropriately. They should consider identifying suitable areas for renewable and low carbon energy sources, and supporting infrastructure, where this would help secure their development.
2.1.3. The Dorset Council area includes areas of two national landscapes: the Dorset National Landscape and the Cranborne Chase National Landscape. They are designated as such for their outstanding natural beauty. Public bodies have a duty placed on them to conserve and enhance these protected landscapes (Countryside and Rights of Way Act 2000).
2.1.4. NPPF paragraph 187 identifies that great weight should be given to conserving and enhancing landscape and scenic beauty in National Landscapes, and that these designations have the highest status of protection in relation to these issues. Furthermore, the scale and extent of development within National Landscapes should be limited, while development within their setting should be sensitively located and designed to avoid or minimise adverse impacts on the designated areas.
2.2.1. The Planning Practice Guidance (Paragraph: 003 Reference ID: 5-003-20140306) (PPG) sets out how local planning authorities can develop a positive strategy to promoting the delivery of renewable and low carbon energy. This includes through taking into account the views of local communities, and considering local potential for renewable and low carbon energy generation.
2.2.2. Whilst there is no set methodology, the PPG (Paragraph: 005 Reference ID: 5-005-20150618) provides guidance on how suitable areas for renewable energy can be identified. It sets out that local planning authorities will need to ensure that the requirements of the technology are taken into account, as well as the potential impacts on the local environment, including from cumulative impacts. A district level Landscape Character Assessment may provide a basis for assessing the likely landscape and visual impacts of a proposal.
2.2.3. The PPG also identifies some benefits to identifying suitable areas, which include giving greater certainty as to where such development will be permitted, and thus reducing the need to consider more speculative applications involving the same type of development when they judge the impact to be unacceptable.
2.2.4. In the case of wind turbines, a planning application should not be approved unless the proposed development site is an area identified as suitable for wind energy development, and maps showing the wind resource as favourable to wind turbines or similar will not be sufficient (Paragraph 032 Reference ID: 5-032-150618).
3.1.1. In order to meet NPPF paragraph 165(b) and Planning Practice Guidance, we commissioned consultants to undertake two assessments to inform the identification of potentially suitable areas for the development of onshore wind turbines, ground mounted solar and battery energy storage systems:
3.1.2. The assessments focus on onshore wind turbines, ground mounted solar, and battery energy storage systems as these are the types of renewable energy development that are most likely to come forward in the Dorset Council area. Other types of renewable energy proposals are still possible and would be considered on their merits.
3.1.3. The assessments categorise the three development types into various scales that are considered to reflect those that are most likely to be put forward by developers and which may meet the varying needs of different types of applicants.
3.1.4. The Dorset Renewable Energy Assessment is available at: Dorset Council Local Plan Consultation.
3.2.1. The resource assessment looks at the technical potential for development of onshore wind turbines, ground mounted solar and battery energy storage systems, through the application of various constraints and assumptions, including those relating to:
3.2.2. For wind energy, the assessment indicates the technical suitability of land for the following development scales:
3.2.3. Due to the ‘modular’ nature of ground mounted solar panels and the fact that constraints are not affected by project scale in the way they are for wind energy, the assessment has not been broken down into discrete project sizes. Rather, any land technically suitable for development has been identified.
3.2.4. For battery storage, the assessment considers the potential for stand-alone battery storage proposals (over 100MW). Typically, the potential for battery storage development, can be suitably micro-sited alongside solar developments, as well as other renewable developments such as wind. The individual units are similar in size and scale to shipping containers. As such, the technical potential for battery storage associated with wind or solar is covered by the technical potential assessment for these types of developments.
3.2.5. By applying the constraints and assumptions, the assessment identifies areas within Dorset that, at a strategic level, are considered to have technical suitability for development. This is provided in mapped format, as well as giving an indication of the potential energy yield should these areas of technical suitability be developed for these types of renewable energy.
3.2.6. The assessment also makes clear that there are further considerations that would impact the deployment of renewable energy development. For example:
3.2.7. Grid capacity was also considered in the resource assessment, which sets out that generation capacity issues exist and are likely to continue in the immediate future. However, steps taken to address capacity issues, such as recent restructuring of the energy operations at national level, changes to the connections process, and further future investment in grid infrastructure, will need to be factored in to future planning for renewable energy development. Grid capacity has therefore not been included as a constraint to resource for wind energy, ground mounted solar, and battery energy storage, as the identification of opportunity areas can help to influence future investment.
3.3.1. In line with Paragraph 005 (Reference ID: 5-005-20150618) of the PPG the landscape sensitivity work provides an assessment of Dorset’s Landscape Character Types’ (LCT) sensitivity to wind turbines, ground mounted solar, and battery energy storage systems, including those parts of the Council area that lie within the two National Landscapes. This is because the two management plans for the Dorset National Landscape and the Cranborne Chase National Landscape do not restrict renewable developments within the designations. Additionally, planning applications have been forthcoming for solar and battery storage within and in proximity to the national landscapes and it considered that evidence on landscape sensitivity will assist in the consideration of such applications in the future.
3.3.2. The landscape character types are defined in the following assessments:
3.3.3. Each LCT was assessed against the following criteria, which are informed by Natural England guidelines:
3.3.4. For each criterion, each LCT was given a rating of Low, Low-Moderate, Moderate, Moderate-High, or High. The sensitivity assessment then concludes with an overall landscape sensitivity score for the LCT (using the same rating bands) at the following scales of the development types:
3.3.5. For wind energy:
3.3.6. For ground mounted solar:
3.3.7. For battery energy storage:
3.3.8. Where different landscape character areas, which are the component parts of an LCT, have differing sensitivity scores, this is captured in the assessment. The overall scores were then mapped to enable spatial analysis.
4.1.1. In the Dorset Council Local Plan options consultation 2025 we have used early outputs of the two assessments to identify, for consultation, areas of opportunity areas for onshore wind turbines, ground mounted solar and battery energy storage systems, at the varying scales to match those assessed in landscape sensitivity assessment.
4.1.2. Areas of technical suitability (identified through the resource assessment) were overlaid with the draft landscape sensitivity scoring to result in areas that are potential suitable these types of development.
4.1.3. In terms of landscape sensitivity, for each development scale, we identified that in general, areas of moderate-high sensitivity could be considered potentially suitable for development. This was based on discussion with Dorset Council landscape officers, and the fact that existing development that had already been considered through the planning process, fall within areas of moderate-high sensitivity. In general, the landscape sensitivity assessment identifies that areas of moderate-high sensitivity may be able to accommodate development due to the specific characteristics of the relevant LCT.
4.1.4. The whole of the Dorset Council area is deemed to have high sensitivity to very large wind turbines (150-220m blade-tip height), large solar PV installations (20 to 50 ha), and very large solar PV installations (50 to 120 ha).
4.1.5. The areas of opportunity are shown in Appendix D of the consultation material, and on the Local Plan consultation layers on Dorset Explorer. Following the consultation, the finalised assessments, and responses received will be considered to determine areas of opportunity to be included in the final version of the Local Plan. Such areas would be supported by a criteria based policy. It should be noted that the identification of such areas does not and would not indicate that the whole area would be suitable for the type of development specified; and that individual planning applications within the areas of opportunity would still be required to submit detailed site specific assessments and would be subject to the normal determination process including consideration of the cumulative impacts of similar developments.
