Raeshaw Farms Limited v Scottish Ministers: A Change of Wind Direction?

The Court’s Decision

On 17 February 2026, the Inner House of the Court of Session delivered a decision in Raeshaw Farms Limited v Scottish Ministers [2026] CSIH 10. The Court quashed the planning permission for the Wull Muir Wind Farm, granted on appeal, and remitted the decision back to the Scottish Ministers for a different reporter to retake the decision.

The Court held that:

• the reporter, in deciding to grant consent, erred in failing to consider whether the wind farm and grid connection constituted one project for EIA purposes; and
• there was force in the argument that it was irrational to take the benefits of a connected, operational wind farm into account without also addressing potential adverse impacts of the grid connection.

The Court did not decide whether in this instance the wind farm and grid connection were a single project in EIA terms. The Court did however make reference to the non-exhaustive factors listed in R (Wingfield) v Canterbury City Council [2020] JPL 154 (common ownership, simultaneous determinations, functional interdependence, and stand-alone project status) and referred to decisions from the Republic of Ireland and Spain which indicated that a wind farm and grid connection are one ‘project’ which requires to be assessed in order to comply with the EIA Directive.

Implications for Scotland and the UK

There are some initial observations and lingering questions which are left unanswered by the Court.

• Importantly, the Court did not hold that a single consent application is required for the whole project. So the grid connection could be part of the ‘project’ for EIA purposes, but does not need to be included in the same consent application as the wind farm.
• The Court did not set out what level of EIA assessment may be required for the parts of a ‘project’ which are not in the consent application itself (i.e. in this case the grid connection). The Court held that assessment of “the potentially significant cumulative effects of both aspects” (our emphasis) is required and also noted the need for realism - in which case it may be appropriate to assess the grid connection like other cumulative developments on the basis of the information available at the time of the wind farm application (and which presumably may be partly indicative?). However, the Court does not provide clear and consistent guidance on this matter.
• The implications beyond wind also remain to be seen – the principles set out by the Court could apply to projects including solar, data centres and transport. In a networked world, where is the line drawn?
• What implications are there for other legal regimes? For example, transmission and distribution operators who currently use permitted development (PD) rights to install cables (which are generally not available for EIA development)? Or Habitats Regulations Assessment – must this also be for the whole project, including compensation?

Conclusion

For Scottish wind farms, it seems likely that it will no longer be sufficient to state that off-site works are “not part of the current proposal” and leave their environmental implications to a later consent process.

Beyond wind and beyond Scotland, the judgment reinforces principles found in England and Wales, particularly following Ashchurch and related Court of Appeal authority. It confirms that the identity of the “project” is not necessarily confined to the red line boundary of the application and that the definition of “project” is a matter of evaluative judgment, subject to public law review. The clear direction of travel is towards more rigorous scrutiny of functional interdependence and cumulative effects.

Going Forwards

A key unsettled practical question for all UK projects is what level of assessment is needed where a connected element outside a consent application is considered to be part of the ‘whole project’ for EIA purposes (as seems likely now to be a regular conclusion, at least for wind farm grid connections).

In our view, a higher level approach may be appropriate for elements of the ‘whole project’ not in the consent application itself. Such an approach would take into account the well-established approach to EIA cumulative and indirect effects assessment, noting the Court’s frequent references to “cumulative” assessment. To require the assessment of connected elements to be at the same level as the development within the application itself was not expressly required by the Court, is not realistic in light of the current UK consenting and regulatory regimes, and would place a disproportionate burden on developers, local communities and statutory consultees.

Whatever the longer term implications, in the very short term, the decision creates a potential risk of challenge for recently consented projects, particularly where a wind farm has been approved without any assessment of its associated grid connection and the reasoning on project separation is sparse.