Our operations

Listening and responding

Developing energy assets requires close liaison with local stakeholders, particularly in the pre-consent planning stages and construction, but also during the following years of operation. We engage widely with stakeholders to assess the social and environmental impact of our renewables projects and are committed to working with local communities at every stage.

Our approach is to deliver a proactive and responsive programme of meetings with individual groups and public exhibitions to engage with our neighbours and ensure that their interests are taken into consideration. We circulate a wide range of information such as scoping documents, which sets out the basis for scientific studies, enabling interested parties to comment and provide further information where necessary.

Investing in communities

We focus our community investment on education, working with local schools and other community organisations to raise awareness of renewables and wider issues relating to sustainability.

For example, we supported the redevelopment of the visitor centre at Gibraltar Point National Nature Reserve in Skegness, near our Lincs offshore development. The reserve, which stretches from the southern edge of Skegness to the entrance to The Wash, attracts around 180,000 visitors each year. Another educational initiative has been to work with local teachers in Skegness to help deliver useful lessons on renewables and sustainability that help meet the needs of the National Curriculum.

In Barrow-in-Furness, near our Barrow offshore wind farm, we have forged a partnership with Walney School, supporting the school’s ambitions to make engineering a key part of the curriculum. More details of our involvement can be found in the community sections of individual project pages on this site

A booklet outlining our community approach can be accessed by following the link "responsible renewables" below.

• Responsible Renewables PDF (0.47Mb)
• Questionnaire: feedback on the Lincs Offshore Wind Project PDF (0.45Mb)
• Public opinion feedback (0.10Mb)