Legal firm Anderson Strathern hails advisory role regarding ScotWind agreements

Scottish legal firm Anderson Strathern has flagged how it has advised Crown Estate Scotland on all the ScotWind offshore leasing agreements – adding that it looks forward to continuing to work on “what is a vitally important step towards achieving net zero”.

Anderson Strathern, which earlier this year announced higher annual profits and revenues, said it has advised longstanding client Crown Estate Scotland on all 17 of the relevant offshore wind leasing agreements.

ScotWind, it added, is a £700 million programme and the first offshore wind leasing round in over a decade, also marking the first award of projects since the management of offshore wind rights were devolved to Scotland.

Anderson Strathern was reappointed as legal adviser to Crown Estate Scotland in 2021, and it guided the latter on a range of issues as part of the ScotWind Leasing process, such as consenting, process structure, procurement and competition matters, drafting of tender documents, and project documentation.

The delivery of the 17 option agreements was completed in fewer than three months, with the project involving specialists from across the firm, it added, in clean energy, marine property, planning, procurement, competition law, litigation, and corporate.

Gavin Thain, a partner in Anderson Strathern’s clean energy team, said: “As a longstanding adviser to Crown Estate Scotland, we were able to deploy informed specialists across the firm to work on what was a complex project with a short timetable. We’re pleased to see ScotWind progressing well, and look forward to continuing to support Crown Estate Scotland in the months and years ahead on what is a vitally important step towards achieving net-zero.”

The firm, which recently announced a partnership with angel association Linc Scotland, also said Crown Estate Scotland is a public corporation that “invests in property, natural resources and people, to create lasting value for Scotland”, managing seabed, coastline, rural estates and more, helping ensure businesses and communities benefit from its assets.

From left: Gavin Thain, Bruce Farquhar, Dixcee Fast and Deborah Lovell of Anderson Strathern. Picture: Stewart Attwood.

Colin Maciver, head of offshore wind for Crown Estate Scotland, said: “Seventeen agreements are now in place to help deliver these offshore wind projects that are central to Scotland’s efforts to tackle the climate emergency, secure the UK’s energy supply, and generate billions of pounds of investment in Scotland. This is an early but critical step towards having turbines in the water ready to generate clean energy.”

A message from the Editor:

Thank you for reading this article. We're more reliant on your support than ever as the shift in consumer habits brought about by coronavirus impacts our advertisers.

If you haven't already, please consider supporting our trusted, fact-checked journalism by taking out a digital subscription.