ScotWind
Scotland's offshore wind seabed leasing round, run by Crown Estate Scotland.
In three straight years from 2023-24 ministers budgeted ScotWind fee drawdowns of £310m, £424m and £364m and drew nothing each time, Audit Scotland found on 17 September 2026.
Last refreshed: 7 October 2026 · Appears in 1 active topic
Holyrood budgeted £1.1bn of ScotWind money and drew none. Where is the £808m?
Timeline for ScotWind
Generated the licence fees held on deposit
Is Britain Actually Broke?: Holyrood booked £1.1bn of ScotWind drawsBackground
ScotWind is Scotland's offshore wind seabed leasing round, run by Crown Estate Scotland. Developers pay option fees for seabed rights. By the end of 2025-26 those payments totalled £807.9m in Crown Estate Scotland's keeping, almost all placed on 12-month term deposits so ministers can call on the money at short notice. Interest on the fees has reached £95.6m.
Audit Scotland's report of 17 September 2026 traces how the money has been budgeted. Holyrood planned to draw £310m in 2023-24, £424m in 2024-25 and £364m in 2025-26, and reversed each draw at the spring budget revision or the year end, so nothing was taken. The 2026-27 budget counts on a further £80m. So FAR the only ScotWind money spent is £96m of fees and £7m of interest, both in 2022-23.
Ministers plan to draw another £507m by 2031, which would leave about £300m, without saying what it will fund. The Scottish Government has promised a ScotWind Wealth Fund before the parliamentary term ends. Audit Scotland warns that leaning on one-off receipts to balance annual budgets can weaken control of spending.