EIR/202300383485 · FOI/EIR · partially withheld
Meetings between Renewable Energy Systems Limited (RES) and Energy Consents Unit (ECU) for the Blair Hill Wind Farm scoping report: EIR release
Information requested
“I would like to ask for a freedom of information Request for all information or details of meetings Held Between RES Energy for the Blairhill scoping report .And The ECU.”
Response
As the information you have requested is ‘environmental information’ for the purposes of the Environmental Information (Scotland) Regulations 2004 (EIRs), we are required to deal with your request under those Regulations. We are applying the exemption at section 39(2) of the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002 (FOISA), so that we do not also have to deal with your request under FOISA.
This exemption is subject to the ‘public interest test’. Therefore, taking account of all the circumstances of this case, we have considered if the public interest in disclosing the information outweighs the public interest in applying the exemption. We have found that, on balance, the public interest lies in favour of upholding the exemption, because there is no public interest in dealing with the same request under two different regimes. This is essentially a technical point and has no material effect on the outcome of your request.
Response to your request
Please find attached a copy of emails relating to the pre-application meeting held between Renewable Energy Systems Limited (RES) and the ECU on 14 August 2023 to discuss the Blair Hill Wind Farm scoping opinion request.
The Scottish Government’s Energy Consents Unit (ECU) offer a pre-application meeting to developers requesting a scoping opinion from Scottish Ministers as they present an opportunity for the developer to introduce the proposal.
Case officers may choose to take notes relating to the proposed development such as description of the project (e.g. megawatt capacity, location, technology type), planned public engagement and indicative project timescales for submission of documents to the ECU. However formal minutes are not typically taken at these meetings. No further meetings have been held between RES and ECU to discuss the scoping opinion request for Blair Hill Wind Farm.
About FOI
The Scottish Government is committed to publishing all information released in response to Freedom of Information requests. View all FOI responses at http://www.gov.scot/foi-responses.
Detected exemption language
We are applying the exemption at section 39(2) of the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002 (FOISA), so that we do not also have to deal with your request under FOISA. This exemption is subject to the ‘public interest test’. Therefore, taking account of all the circumstances of this case, we have considered if the public interest in disclosing the information outweighs the public interest in applying the exemption. We have found that, on balance, the public interest lies in favour of upholding the exemption, because there is no public interest in dealing with the same request under two different regimes.