Draft Fisheries Assessment – North-East Faroe-Shetland Channel NCMPA: Fisheries management measures within Scottish Offshore Marine Protected Areas (MPAs)

4. Part C Assessment- In combination assessment

4.1 In combination assessment overview

Part C of this assessment considers the cumulative impacts, which may occur over space and time, in relation to activities occurring within the MPA. Activities assessed in this section include the following:

• Fishing activity/pressure combinations which were excluded in Part A of this assessment as not being capable of impacting the feature;
• Fishing interactions assessed in Part B but that would not hinder the conservation objectives for the site; and
• Activities occurring within North-East Faroe-Shetland Channel NCMPA that are not related to fishing.

Fishing activities including demersal trawls have been identified in Part B as requiring management and will therefore not be considered in Part C. Pelagic fishing is not considered here as there is no interaction between the activity and the protected features.

4.2 Other offshore region activities screening

To determine activities not related to fishing activities to be included within this part of the assessment, a distance of 5 km was selected as suitable to capture any potential source receptor pathways that could impact the site in combination with effects of the fishing activities assessed. A 5 km buffer was therefore applied to the site boundary to identify relevant activities.

Activities not related to fishing activities were identified using the Scottish Government’s marine mapping tool. The JNCC Conservation Advice package including the Management Options Paper (2014), and other resources on the JNCC Site Information Centre for North-East Faroe-Shetland Channel NCMPA, were also screened for activities occurring in the site that should be considered in the in-combination assessment.

The map to display offshore region activities (see Figure. 3) was derived from OceanWise’s Marine Themes Vector data (July 2023 version), Crown Estate Scotland leases (September 2023 version), Kingfisher Information Services Offshore Renewable Cable Awareness (KIS-ORCA, as of December 2023 held under licence) and North Sea Transition Authority (NSTA, as of December 2023, data held under Oil and Gas Authority open licence). The Marine Themes “Industrial” was filtered to show offshore region platforms, wellheads, piles, turbines, cables, and pipelines. Features marked as “not in use”, “not present”, “decommissioned”, or “removed” were excluded. The “Administrative” data were filtered to only show military exercise areas which included danger areas.

4.3 Other offshore region activities occurring within North-East Faroe-Shetland Channel NCMPA

The screening exercise using the Scottish Government’s marine mapping tool did not identify any current pipelines, turbines or piles, or offshore region platforms within the site. There are three subsea cables and 6 suspended/decommissioned wellheads overlapping with the site (Figure 3). Part of the NCMPA overlaps with oil and gas license blocks and may be subject to further oil and gas development in the future. The Offshore Petroleum Regulator for Environment and Decommissioning (OPRED), as the regulator for oil and gas activity in the UK, would be responsible for making the decision as to whether a proposed activity and/or development is capable of affecting the protected features of the site should any oil and gas activity be considered within the site.

4.4 Potential pressures exerted by fishing and other activities

Risks associated with telecommunication cable operation and maintenance were assessed for the subsea cables within the site. The cables are currently in place, removing the risk of any pressures associated with laying, or burial and protection. The pressures exerted during operation and maintenance were identified as physical change (to another seabed type) and physical change (to another sediment type), both these were considered to be exerted at a low level and therefore not considered likely to impact the protected features of the site.

As the decommissioned well heads are in-situ and have no associated activity, these are not considered to exert any pressures that will interact with the protected features of the site.

4.5 Significance of effects/impact to protected features

Considering all current fishing activity within the site has been identified in Part B as requiring management measures, the assessment did not identify any in-combination activities that were considered likely to affect the protected features of the site of North East Faroe Shetland Channel MPA.

4.6 Part C Conclusion

Scottish Ministers conclude that by implementing measures for demersal trawl there are no in-combination effects with other relevant activities which hinder the achievement of the conservation objectives for the North-East Faroe-Shetland Channel NCMPA.