Designing an effective offshore wind market: How to optimise marine spatial planning to deploy offshore wind quickly and responsibly

This policy briefing highlights three essential principles for using marine spatial planning to support offshore wind development.

Designing an effective offshore wind market - report cover by the Carbon Trust Net Zero Intelligence Unit

Overview

Marine spatial planning (MSP) is a process for managing and allocating areas for the various human activities that take place at sea, including fishing, shipping, marine conservation and offshore wind development.

Although it is not a silver bullet, MSP can help to optimise the number, scale and location of offshore wind projects, minimise conflict with other stakeholders, and reduce the likelihood of challenges during windfarm development. However, if applied ineffectively, MSP can be a lengthy, data-intensive and procedure-heavy process that limits progress towards climate goals.
The Carbon Trust has analysed MSP approaches in eight key markets and drawn from our experience of working directly with governments, to identify three main principles that all governments should consider, to ensure that MSP leads to responsible and efficient offshore wind development:

  1. Alignment with other aspects of the regulatory framework
  2. A standardised process, applied at regular intervals
  3. Clarity and transparency about the planning process and its outcomes

This is the fourth in a series of policy briefings aiming to help policymakers design effective offshore wind markets. Read the rest of the series below:

 

Discover more about our offshore wind work

Discover more about our Net Zero Intelligence Unit

 

 

 

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