Key Considerations

Specialist field surveys are a key part of the development of a site and these establish the existing environmental conditions. The solar farm has been designed to avoid significant impacts on the environment. We will seek to mitigate or reduce negative impacts that are identified, while enhancing potential positive impact. A pre-application consultation exercise was undertaken with Fife Council to agree the approach to environmental assessment across key topic areas. As part of our development proposal we have considered:

Transport and Access

The site will be accessed off a new junction with the A823, shown on the Site Layout Plan. This has been agreed in consultation with the local highways authority. A Transport Report and Construction Traffic Management Plan will assess the ability of the road network to accommodate construction-related traffic. Traffic generation associated with the project will be restricted almost exclusively to the construction period, which is likely to be up to 12 months. Once operational, traffic movements will be no more than a car or van visiting the site on average, 1-2 times per week.

Flood Risk and Hydrology

A Flood Risk Assessment undertaken for the site has concluded that the development would have a low flood risk potential; this is partly due to the nature of the proposal in that it does not include the creation of large areas of hardstanding.  The first principle of development has been to avoid impacts on watercourses or hydrological receptors through appropriate separation distances from the infrastructure and this is reflected in the Site Layout Plan.

Peat

The Proposed Development site does not contain high quality agricultural land. The site does, however, contains areas of peat but most of this is relatively shallow. Solar farms are a relatively simplistic form of development which, by their very nature, are non-intrustive with very little associted ground works required during construction. Although peat can be a sensitive environmental constraint, there are various low impact construction techniques that can be adopted if required to minimise and mitigate effects. The image below shows the peat probing points undertaken across the site showing various peat depths.

Cultural Heritage

Survey assessment work has identified a number of Heritage assets within the site and beyond. There are no statutory designationa within the site but there is an area of archaeological interest associted with the Whitehills agricultural landscape. Layout design avoids diect impacts on important features. Solar fsrms are a reversible form of development with land restored to its current use after its operational life, nevertheless, we are prepared to agree to an appropriate ‘preservation by record’ planning condition providing a high-resolution LIDAR image of the Site showing how it looks today.

Visual impact

Views of the site from the surrounding area are very limited due to it being generally well contained, with hills and forestry screening it from many locations. It rises gently northward but is relatively flat. The proposal includes screening on the roadside boundary which reduceds the visibility of the project to passing vehicles. The below ZTV represents the geographical areas from which the solar park could theoretically be seen. These are represented by the areas shaded yellow. The panels are not predicted to be visible from areas left unshaded/white. The ZTV does not take into account some localised features such as small copses, hedgerows or individual trees and therefore still gives an exaggerated impression of the extent of visibility. The actual extent of visibility on the ground will be less than that suggested by the ZTV.

The application will be accompanied by a Landscape & Visual Assessment.   

Ecology

Habitat and bird surveys have been undertaken and have helped inform the design process and opportunities for environmental enhancement. These surveys, along with a peat assessment have ensured that enhancement measures are an integral part of the proposals, from concept, design, through to formal submission of the proposal and construction. aA survey of the condition of the peatland on site has found that it is largely degraded due to extensive drainage and grazing by livestock and deer. Opportunities to ‘re-wet’ large areas of degraded bog habitats are being investigated. Additional hedgerow planting along the road frontage will be delivered as part of the project.