Gillian Martin

Community groups, from South Lanarkshire to the Highlands, will be given the chance to lease one of 10 publicly-owned Forestry Land and Scotland (FLS) sites with windfarms as they approach repowering.

The pilot, which makes changes to the Community Asset Transfer Scheme (CATS), will provide a protected window for local groups to make an asset transfer request to lease FLS sites to extend the operational life of the windfarms.

The new approach, developed with FLS, will help strengthen the community asset transfer process which enables communities to request to buy or lease publicly owned land they feel they could make better use of.

Other changes to CATS will see community groups given: 

• Advance notification of upcoming lease opportunities, so they have time to prepare asset transfer requests before sites go to market 
• Dedicated guidance for repowering projects, including support on financing projects, evaluation and governance  
• Targeted support through the Community and Renewable Energy Scheme (CARES), including help to develop proposals

Energy secretary Gillian Martin said: “Ownership and control of land is a powerful tool for communities to drive change and can help to develop local economies, provide activities and services, and boost community identity.  

“These new measures will make it easier for groups across Scotland to reap the rewards from renewable energy projects on Forestry Land Scotland sites with the potential to deliver real benefits to a local area.  

“It is yet another way that we are ensuring that communities can benefit from Scotland’s transition to renewable energy and that we are helping provide a just transition to net zero for people across the country.” 

Community Energy Scotland CEO Zoe Holliday, added: “We have seen time and time again the transformation impact of land ownership and ownership of energy assets on communities across Scotland. 

“Right now, repowering of private developments represents one of the biggest opportunities to upscale the community energy sector at pace and meet the Scottish Government’s community energy targets; community energy groups are increasingly ambitious but gaining grid access continues to be a challenge, which is why taking on existing sites has so much potential. 

“Today’s announcement is a promising first step by the Scottish Government in starting to open up the public estate for large community energy projects and we look forward to working with them to continue to unlock opportunities for the community energy sector going forward.”