Technical Report 3. Socio-economic impacts of offshore wind farms (OWFs): Non-UK EU member states studies
Executive summary. Research aims and methods: The review of Environmental Statements (ESs) sought to determine the socio-economic content of EU member state offshore wind farms (OWFs). This was part of a project funded by the European Offshore Windfarm Development Centre research programme (EOWDC). It parallels a similar study of ESs for UK OWFs. The aim of the EOWDC project is multifaceted: explore methods used to predict socio-economic impacts of OWFs, to enhance understanding of OWF socio-economic impacts (SEI), highlight best practice in how to maximize local benefits and compare predicted impacts with actual impacts. This report includes two elements. The first explores the extent of coverage of socio-economic impacts (SEI) in Environmental Statements (ESs) for recent large OWF projects across a range of European countries. The second element reviews the legislation and policy behind OWFs for EU member state countries to determine how different approaches impact on the socio-economic content of ESs and methodology employed. The review concentrated on OWFs of c50MW and over undertaken from 2010 onwards. The review included 13 projects, in five countries (Denmark, the Netherlands, Belgium, Sweden and ES review of socio-economic impacts content—Non-UK EU countries Ireland), ranging in size from 50MW to 752MW. Researchers translated relevant chapters in the ESs were ESs into English using an online translation tool. There was an assessment of ES chapters against a 9-point template covering the research aims, including to: document the extent to which SEI are covered in the ESs, identify the relative coverage of social, economic and other impacts (e.g. cumulative), and identify the relative coverage of SEI in the various stages of the OWF lifecycle. The research also seeks to identify trends over time and to explain variations in ES consideration of impacts (e.g. more coverage for larger projects; any variations according to distance from shore). There is also a consideration of evolving approaches to ...