Scottish new National Parks - phase 2 - strategic environmental assessment (SEA): SEA reasonable alternatives report

1. Introduction

Background: The New National Park proposals

1.1 The Scottish Government is proposing to establish a new National Park in Scotland and to modernise Scotland’s National Parks legislation.

1.2 With regards to the designation of a new National Park in Scotland, the nomination process began in October 2023. Communities and organisations across Scotland were invited to develop and submit their proposals to become Scotland’s next National Park by the end of February 2024. Five bids were received, and these were appraised against published criteria.

1.3 As a result of this process, Scottish Ministers have proposed that a new National Park should be established in Galloway, with the potential area extending to parts of Dumfries and East and South Ayrshire. They have appointed NatureScot to be the Reporter to investigate the proposal, and provided directions for how this work should be undertaken.

Strategic environmental assessment for the New National Park proposals

1.4 To support the development of the Future of National Parks proposals, an independent Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) is being undertaken.

1.5 SEA is a systematic process for evaluating the environmental effects of proposed plans, programmes and strategies to ensure that significant adverse effects are either avoided or mitigated and significant positive effects are enhanced, where either is possible.

1.6 The SEA is a means of supporting the evidence base for the new National Park proposals and provides an opportunity for proposals and alternative approaches to be evaluated in terms of their likely significant effects on the environment. It is being undertaken in line with the procedures prescribed by the Environmental Assessment (Scotland) Act 2005.

1.7 To date there have been two main outputs of the SEA process (Phase 1 within Figure 1, above):

• The first document was the combined SEA Screening and Scoping Report (May 2023), which included an initial environmental baseline and the ‘framework’ against which The Future of National Parks proposals are being assessed.
• The second document of the SEA process was the Environmental Report. The main output of the SEA process to date, this accompanied the Future of National Parks proposals for consultation between September and November 2023. The Environmental Report presented an assessment of the proposals as consulted on, alongside a range of reasonable alternatives.

1.8 The Environmental Report can be accessed via the following link:

The Future of National Parks in Scotland SEA

This SEA Environmental Report Addendum

1.9 NatureScot is undertaking a formal consultation between November 2024 and February 2025 on whether a new National Park should be established in Galloway and parts of South and East Ayrshire. The consultation includes proposals for what a potential new National Park might consist of, including in terms of its area, powers, functions, and its board makeup. It also seeks to gauge opinion on the proposal and alternatives to it.

1.10 This SEA Environmental Report Addendum has been prepared to accompany the consultation (Phase 2 in Figure 1, above). It presents an assessment of five options relating to the potential spatial extent of a new national park.

1.11 This builds on the previous assessment work undertaken, which was presented in the Environmental Report in November 2023. This earlier work considered different approaches relating to the criteria for national parks in Scotland, and considered, from a high-level perspective, potential broad locations for a new national park. This Addendum is therefore an addendum to the Environmental Report; its intention is to consider only the specific localised likely effects, rather than re-assessing matters already assessed in the Environmental Report.