Recommendation 5

If planning examinations stray too far into matters reserved to other regimes this will undermine those regulators. While the exhaustive drafting of the criteria in EN-7 may simply be intended to empower the Planning Inspectorate and the Secretary of State to consider a wide range of relevant factors, this overlooks the pressures on applicants, facing tight project 24 schedules and litigious opponents, which will drive them to “gold plate” their applications with excessive detail to minimise the chance of delay. This could also discourage a fleet-based deployment strategy, where standardisation and replication are key to achieving economies of scale. (Conclusion, Paragraph 29)