The list below is a record of advice the Planning Inspectorate has provided in respect of the Planning Act 2008 process.
There is a statutory duty under section 51 of the Planning Act 2008 to record the advice that is given in relation to an application or a potential application and to make this publicly available. Advice we have provided is recorded below together with the name of the person or organisation who asked for the advice and the project it relates to. The privacy of any other personal information will be protected in accordance with our Information Charter which you should view before sending information to the Planning Inspectorate.
Note that after a project page has been created for a particular application, any advice provided that relates to it will also be published under the ‘s51 advice’ tab on the relevant project page.
Advice given between between 1 October 2009 and 14 April 2015 has been archived. View the archived advice.
General
Enquiry
Dear Planning Inspectorate,
Please could you advise as follows.
An energy generation project has been granted planning consent by a local planning authority as it is under 50MW.
The developer now wishes to extend the project which would take it over the 50MW threshold by an additional 5 to 10MW. Would this additional generation require an application for development consent to the Planning Inspectorate?
Best regards
Donna Clarke
Advice given
Dear Ms Clarke
Thank you for your letter dated 15 April 2015 enquiring whether extending a generating station to above 50 megawatts would require a development consent under the 2008 Planning Act (as amended)(‘PA2008’).
Under section 14(1)(a) the construction or extension of a generating station is defined as a Nationally Significant Infrastructure Project (‘NSIP’). Section 15 of PA2008 clarifies that the construction or an extension of a generating station is within section 14(1)(a) only if the generating station is or (when constructed or extended) is expected to be, amongst other things, a generating station that is in England or Wales, not an offshore generating station, and its capacity is more than 50 megawatts.
Section 31 makes clear that consent under the Act is required for development that is or forms part of an NSIP. There is no mechanism under the Act to exempt projects from the NSIP process if they meet the relevant thresholds. Therefore a generating station that falls within s14 and s15 of the Act could not proceed by another process such as the Electricity Act 1989 consenting regime.
In the scenario described in your letter, increasing the capacity of the generating station to above 50 Megawatts would make it an NSIP and would require an application for development consent under section 14(1)(a) of PA2008.
The Planning Inspectorate has also published a series of advice notes that are intended to inform developers, consultees, the public and others about a range of process matters in relation to PA2008 which may be of assistance to you. These advice notes can be access by following this link: attachment 1
