Abstract
Purpose and Objectives of the Plan
This Vessel Management and Navigation Safety Plan (VMNSP) has been prepared to address the specific requirements of the relevant conditions attached to the Section 36 (S36) consent and Marine Licences (collectively referred to as ‘offshore consent conditions’) issued to Moray Offshore Windfarm (West) Limited (Moray West).
The offshore consent conditions require submission of both a Vessel Management Plan (VMP) and Navigational Safety Plan (NSP). However, given there are elements of both plans that are of direct relevance to each other, as agreed with Marine Scotland Licensing Operations Team (MS-LOT), the VMP and NSP are being submitted as a single VMNSP.
The relevant conditions discharged by the VMNSP are detailed in Table B3.1 in Appendix B, which also outlines where in this document the specific requirements of the offshore consent conditions are met. This document applies to vessel management and navigational safety of the Moray West Offshore Wind Farm and Offshore Transmission Infrastructure (OfTI) (collectively referred to as ‘the Development’), in accordance with the relevant guidance, during construction and operation.
Scope of the Plan
This VMNSP has been produced for the purpose of providing the required information to the Scottish Ministers and Licensing Authority on vessel management and navigational safety during the construction and Operation and Maintenance (O&M) phases, in order to mitigate the impact of project vessels and the navigational risk to other legitimate users of the sea. Decommissioning of the Development will require a separate Marine Licence and therefore consideration of the vessel management and navigational safety will be undertaken at the time of decommissioning to support the Marine Licence application. Therefore, this VSMNP does not consider the decommissioning phase of the Development.
The information provided in this document is based on the current understanding of the baseline environment and how the Development will be constructed and operated using the best available technologies, in compliance with current legislation and best practice at the time of writing.
Structure of the Plan
In response to the requirements of the offshore consent conditions, this VMNSP has been structured to clearly set out how each part of the specific requirements has been met and that the relevant information to allow the Scottish Ministers to approve the VMNSP has been provided. The document structure is set out below.