Renewables
Recent years have seen a resurgence of the demand on rural land for renewable energy projects. Our agricultural law specialists collaborate with experts from other teams around the firm to provide a full service for developers and landowners.
As part of the climate change agenda, Scotland has set some ambitious targets, including net zero by 2035 and a completely decarbonised energy system by 2050. All types of rural land – farms, forests and estates – are increasingly providing resources for renewable energy projects.
The projects themselves are also evolving, often becoming larger in scale and focusing on the development of new technologies. Our team includes several renewables specialists such as Petra Grunenberg, Emma Robertson, Richard Leslie and Stuart Greenwood. Over the years our teams have advised on projects involving all the technologies currently in use, including onshore and offshore wind, solar, battery storage, synchronous condenser, biomass, and hydro.
When advising on these projects, we put together a full-service team in which our rural specialists are joined by experts from across the wider firm. That might be our market-leading Clean Energy team, Infrastructure, Planning, Regulatory, Corporate, or others.
This combination of detailed knowledge and commercial insight means we that we can guide you on all aspects of the project from beginning to end, including specialist issues such as habitat management schemes, reinstatement obligations and the interaction of carbon credits with renewables developments.
Our combined expertise includes:
- Option and lease negotiations
- Completing the due diligence process
- Variations to existing agreements to account for the re-powering or expansion of existing projects
- Providing guidance on the interaction of a renewables development with pre-existing farming and forestry businesses
- Resolution of disputes
- Procurement
- Funders’ due diligence
- Environmental and planning issues
- Regulatory and aviation issues
- Mergers and acquisitions
- Structuring and re-structuring of projects
Related articles and insights: Renewables
30 June 2025
Connections reforms: Gate 2 to Whole Queue timeline and challenges
Contributor: Liz McRobb
The recently published National Energy System Operator’s connections reform timetable requires all developers who have projects with existing signed connection agreements in place to apply for a Gate 2 offer to receive an identified connection location and energisation date for their project. This marks the single biggest administrative exercise we have ever seen impacting grid agreements.
Contact us