Sectoral marine plan - offshore wind for innovation and targeted oil and gas decarbonisation: initial plan framework

6 Initial Plan Framework – Interface with The Crown Estate Scotland Leasing Process.

6.1 The power requirement for oil and gas installation in the Targeted Oil and Gas Decarbonisation initiative underpinned by this IPF has been identified as 4GW. This framework will, in addition, support Innovation projects with a generation capacity of up to 500MW.

6.2 In alignment with the recently published SMP-OWE,^[8] an average deployment density of 5MW/km² will be adopted as a planning assumption for this framework, including for the Marine Scotland Plan Assessments process.

6.3 On that basis, operation development of the 4GW and 500MW generation capacities would imply a requirement for 800km² and 100km² respectively.

6.4 However, whilst the foregoing provides an indication of the scale of the total areas of seabed expected to ultimately be used for the projects that are expected to progress under INTOG, it does not account for any difficulties or constraints that may be encountered at the project level, nor the possible attrition of projects due to any unforeseen circumstances. It also does not account for improvements in technology or new or more effective mitigation measures that could lower the impact of a specific project whilst still using the same area or allow for a higher generation output per km².

6.5 To account for such uncertainties, CES expects to offer a number of Option Agreements, over specific areas of seabed that may total larger areas than the two areas set out in paragraph 6.3. In offering such Option Agreements, the following should be taken into account:

For Targeted Oil and Gas Decarbonisation projects:

• the area of seabed to be offered Option Agreements for Targeted Oil and Gas Decarbonisation projects should not exceed 1900km²;^[9] and
• the potential generation capacity for the set of projects to be offered Options Agreements for Targeted Oil and Gas Decarbonisation projects should not total more than 5.7GW in total^[10]

For Innovation projects:

• the area of seabed to be offered under Option Agreements for Innovation projects should not exceed 167km² in total; and
• the potential generation capacity for the set of projects to be offered Option Agreements for Innovation projects should not exceed 500MW in total.

6.6 The above requirements will also be applied by CES at the exclusivity stage.

6.7 Due to the targeted nature of INTOG as a planning framework and the wide ranging areas that are available for project identification, these IPF limits are designed to promote a focussed and efficient planning and leasing round. All projects will still be subject to plan-level, and if successful at that stage, project-level assessments (including cumulative assessments) and the requirements of the consenting process. Whilst 4GW has been identified as the energy demand, this figure is subject to the plan-level assessments (as described in 3.6), taking into account pre-ScotWind, ScotWind and INTOG developments.

6.8 Further to the specifications set out above, there is an understanding that offshore wind projects progressing through the Targeted Oil and Gas category of the Plan may target both brownfield and greenfield oil and gas assets; i.e. assets already in production or new assets coming forward. This planning process has been designed to facilitate the electrification and, ultimately, the decommissioning of existing projects as Scotland transitions to net zero. Greenfield electrification is not excluded but the prioritisation of initial allocation of Option Agreements to projects targeting existing assets is being examined. CES is exploring a mechanism by which this allocation could potentially be implemented via the leasing process and this would be outlined in CES documents when the process commences.