Sectoral marine plan: islands communities impact assessment

Recommendations and next steps:

The evidence above demonstrates that the implementation of duties under the Islands (Scotland) Act 2018 to date has directly informed the development of the Plan. An iterative approach has been taken to the development of the final Plan, to ensure it is reflective of stakeholder views and the conclusions of the supporting Sustainability Appraisal.

Following adoption, the final Plan will be subject to iterative plan review and the ICIA will be reviewed and amended (if appropriate) if further assessment is required. The Plan and Post Adoption Statement set out in detail how this process will operate and how stakeholder views and evidence submitted will be gathered and used.

The Plan highlights the importance of early and sustained engagement with potentially impacted communities in relation to future offshore wind developments. Further project-level assessment will be required before development can progress (which will benefit from a greater level of detail regarding the location/scale/timing of the proposed project), to identify and assess the potential negative and positive impacts of development and mitigation measures (as necessary).