Shelborn Drummond Ltd's agent, Scott Hobbs Planning, confirmed on 12 August that it will produce a full environmental impact assessment (EIA, the formal study of a development's environmental effects) for its appeal against Edinburgh Council's refusal of a 212.42 MW data centre at 1 Redheughs Avenue, the former Royal Bank of Scotland headquarters at South Gyle1. The council refused planning permission in principle on 9 February, and the appeal reached the Scottish Government's Planning and Environmental Appeals Division (DPEA, which decides planning appeals in Scotland) on 31 March as case PPA-230-2794.
A DPEA screening direction on 30 July overturned the council's own opinion that no EIA was required. That direction is the moment the appeal changed character. Screening decides whether a scheme's likely effects are significant enough to demand the full study, and the reporter has now said Edinburgh got that call wrong on a scheme drawing more power than many Scottish towns.
At 212.42 MW the power and water demands cannot simply be stated in a planning statement; they have to be modelled, sourced and defended in a document opponents and the reporter can read line by line. A renewable-supply claim survives assertion easily and struggles under assessment.
The case went on hold on 11 August, with a target decision date of 8 September2. That timetable now sits against the production of a full EIA, which is not a document any agent assembles in four weeks. Britain began issuing Gate 2 transmission offers in May, so a scheme that slips loses its place in a queue that has grown considerably harder to re-enter.
