Questions and answers

Question reference: S6W-23997

Asked by: Maurice Golden, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Monday, 18 December 2023
Current Status: Answered by Lorna Slater on 9 January 2024

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S6W-23788 by Lorna Slater on 15 December 2023, what work (a) had been carried out between December 2021 and June 2023 and (b) is planned to update its Deposit Return Scheme Business and Regulatory Impact Assessment.

The Scottish Government has worked with Zero Waste Scotland to update relevant impact assessments at each point the Regulations have been updated, most recently for the Deposit and Return Scheme for Scotland (Miscellaneous Amendment) Regulations 2023 laid in Parliament on 30 June 2023. This updated Business and Regulatory Impact Assessment was shared with Parliament on 11 September 2023 - Scotland's Deposit Return Scheme | Scottish Parliament Website. We plan to update all DRS Impact Assessments again once Defra have confirmed the final design of their scheme

Question reference: S6W-23887

Asked by: Maurice Golden, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 14 December 2023
Current Status: Answered by Mairi McAllan on 9 January 2024

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S6W-23231 by Mairi McAllan on 11 December 2023, how many locations have been monitored as part of the marine plastics monitoring programme in each year since 2013.

The Scottish Government microplastics monitoring programme began in the winter of 2013, and has undertaken annual surveys since that time. 479 locations have been sampled between 2013 and 2022. These sample sites are distributed throughout the 11 Scottish Marine Regions and the Offshore Marine Regions. Not all Regions were sampled in every year and the number of sampling sites visited also varied between years.

The microplastics in surface water assessment in Scotland’s Marine Assessment 2020 gives the number of sample sites visited in each year from 2013-14 to 2019-20. This can be viewed at https://marine.gov.scot/sma/assessment/microplastics-surface-water In addition, the sites sampled each year up to and including 2021-22 can be viewed in the dataset published at https://data.marine.gov.scot/dataset/dataset-sources-sinks-and-hazards-micro-plastics-scotland%E2%80%99s-seas-2013-present/resource#{query:{from:400},view-grid:{columnsWidth:[{column:!season,width:157},{column:!date_deploy,width:149}]}} Data for 2022-23, and the current sampling year of 2023-24 have not yet been published.

Question reference: S6W-23835

Asked by: Maurice Golden, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 12 December 2023
Current Status: Answered by Mairi McAllan on 9 January 2024

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S6W-23294 by Mairi McAllan on 11 December 2023, how many natural flood management schemes are currently operating across Scotland.

The Scottish Government recognizes the importance of natural flood management (NFM) measures in reducing, slowing or otherwise managing flood waters across catchments and along the coast while also delivering multiple environmental benefits. The Scottish Government provides funding to improve and restore catchment processes including hydrological processes through the Water Environment Fund, Peatland Restoration Fund, Nature Restoration Fund and Forestry Grants scheme.

The Scottish Government does not hold the information on the total number of NFM schemes currently operating across Scotland. The Flood Risk Management (Scotland) Act 2009 recognises the important role of, promotes and encourages the use of NFM techniques, however, the responsibility for the development and delivery of flood protection schemes rests with individual local authorities, who are best placed to respond to local resilience needs. The Scottish Government provides funding to local authorities to facilitate this.

Effective catchment management requires all of Scotland's land owners and land managers to play their part. As such, individual landowners may decide to operate their own NFM schemes, and there is no requirement for them to notify Ministers of such activity. However, we encourage everyone operating a scheme and interested in this field to join the Scottish Government funded NFM Network Scotland which has been set up to share knowledge and best practice amongst those working with NFM projects, research or activities.

Question reference: S6W-23834

Asked by: Maurice Golden, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 12 December 2023
Current Status: Answered by Mairi McAllan on 9 January 2024

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S6W-23295 by Mairi McAllan on 11 December 2023, whether the allocation of funding from the Water Environment Fund for measures to remove invasive non-native species is no longer being reviewed on an annual basis.

Each year the Scottish Government provides the Scottish Environment Protection Agency with a grant from the Water Environment Fund (WEF) to support work to deliver our River Basin Management Plan. The projects this supports is reviewed on an annual basis to ensure funding through WEF is targeted on projects which will derive the greatest benefit to Scotland’s rivers and neighbouring communities.

Currently, alternative funding streams for projects to remove Invasive Non-Native Species (INNS) in Scotland enable more effective use of resource and provide greater benefits for biodiversity. Subsequently, WEF funding is at the moment prioritising restoring rivers and improving fish migration.

For more information on funding for INNS, I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-23295 on 11 December 2023. All answers to written Parliamentary Questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at https://www.parliament.scot/chamber-and-committees/written-questions-and-answers .

Question reference: S6W-23325

Asked by: Maurice Golden, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 29 November 2023
Current Status: Answered by Mairi McAllan on 21 December 2023

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide a list of all active funding streams within the (a) Energy and Climate Change and (b) Environment and Forestry directorate, broken down by the (i) purpose of, (ii) launch and end dates of, (iii) total value of and (iv) total amount awarded to date through each funding stream.

The Funding Streams are:

Funding Stream	Purpose	Launch Date	Scheduled End Date	Total Value (Lifetime of Fund (1)	Amount Awarded to Date
Directorate for Energy and Climate Change
SME Loan Scheme	SME Loan and Cashback Scheme.	2008	Ongoing	N/A	£55m to end October 2023.
District Heating Loan Fund (DHLF)	Provides capital loans for zero direct emission heat networks in order to overcome a range of infrastructural issues and help towards implementation costs of heat network projects.	2011	Ongoing	£20.1m	£20.1m
Area Based Schemes	Targets areas to improve energy efficiency of `hard to treat’ properties and remove this as a driver of fuel poverty whilst also reducing CO2 emissions.	April 2013	Ongoing	£611.7m	£474.8m
WABS Loan	To provide loan funding for households to help with the costs of any customer contributions needed under grant funded WHS and ABS programmes.	April 2026	Ongoing	N/A	£820,298 to end October 2023.
Private Rented Sector Landlord Loan Scheme	To provide funding to registered private landlords in Scotland for energy efficiency and clean heating measures.	April 2020	Ongoing	N/A	As of August 2023, £1.3mn of funding has been awarded.
Energy Transition Fund (ETF)	Supporting the North East of Scotland in transitioning away from Oil and Gas to Renewables.	June 2020	April 2025	Up to £75m	£64.6m over 4 projects
Social Housing Net Zero Heat Fund	To support Registered Landlords install zero emission/clean heating and energy efficiency measures in their existing housing stock.	August 2020	March 2026	£200m (2)	£52.6m
Emerging Energy Technologies Fund (EETF)	The £180m Emerging Energy Technologies Fund (EETF) aims to support the development of the Hydrogen sector and Carbon Capture, Utilisation, and Storage (CCUS), including Negative Emissions Technologies (NETs) in Scotland. The Hydrogen Action Plan, published on 14 December 2022, confirmed that up to £100m would be made available to support renewable hydrogen production. To support the development and accelerate projects within the Carbon Capture, Utilisation and Storage (CCUS) sector in Scotland, £80m of EETF funding was directed to projects supporting the development of a CCUS transport and storage network, that will also further enable NETs projects to develop in Scotland.	December 2020	2026	Up to £180m	Hydrogen: Hydrogen Innovation Scheme (HIS): £7m funding allocated to 32 projects in May 2023. CCUS: No awards have been made to date as, due to the UK Government failing to award Track 1 status to Acorn. We are also awaiting confirmation that Acorn will receive Track 2 funding. Subsequently it has not been possible to deploy this support at present.
Scottish Industrial Energy Transformation Fund (SIETF)	Match-funding grant programme for industrial manufacturing sites to invest in energy efficiency or decarbonisation.	December 2020	March 2026	Up to £34m	£9.9m
CARES (current contract/active funding stream 2021 – 2025)	CARES aims to help communities engage in and benefit from the energy transition to net zero. ‎ The current CARES contract, with LES, commenced on 1 April 2021 and will run until 31 March 2025.	1 April 2021	31 March 2025	21/22 to 23/34: £27,050,000 (includes resource costs for administration and management of the scheme).	Total: £11,264,840 (includes funding approved by panel for 23/24 but which is still going through due diligence).
Green Public Sector Estate Decarbonisation Scheme	To support public sector organisations to complete retrofit heat decarbonisation and energy efficiency projects across their estates.	June 2021	March 2026	£200m (2)	£70.9m
Scotland’s Heat Network Fund (SHNF)	SHNF- aims to accelerate deployment of zero emission heat networks. SHNF replaces LCITP below.	February 2022	March 2026	£300m	£10.1m
CO2 Utilisation Challenge Fund	To support the development and demonstration of technologies that can utilise carbon dioxide and transform into products that have market and commercial value.	11 April 2022	Scheduled end date is April 2024.	£5m	No awards have been made to date. (We are working with Scottish Enterprise to administer this fund which is currently open for expressions of interest.)
Just Transition Fund Capacity Building	The Bute House Agreement commits to a Just Transition Fund that will "support and accelerate the transition of the region [North East and Moray] and support the role of Aberdeen and the wider north east as one of Scotland’s centres of excellence for the transition to a net zero economy".	31 May 2022	2032/33	£250,000 ‎ (for 23/24)	£70,250
North East and Moray Just Transition Fund	The Bute House Agreement commits to a Just Transition Fund that will "support and accelerate the transition of the region [North East and Moray] and support the role of Aberdeen and the wider north east as one of Scotland’s centres of excellence for the transition to a net zero economy".	31 May 2022	2032/33	£75m	£44.2m
Heat Network Support Unit	The HNSU supports the development of new low or zero emission heat network projects through expert advice and/or grant funding for the costs associated with the conduction of a detailed feasibility study or detailed project development (i.e. Outline Business Case) a heat network opportunity.	September 2022	Ongoing	Not set	£593,944
Global Renewables Centre (GRC)	To fund the Global Renewables Centre.	27 October 2022	26 October 2025	£86,566 (for 2023/24)	£86,566
National Framework on L&D (ICCCAD)	Funding to generate and share innovative thinking and research on addressing loss and damage at different institutional levels through a series of case studies in Malawi, Rwanda and Zambia.	October 2022	December 2023	£150,000	£150,000
Home Energy Scotland Grant and Loan Scheme	To provide funding to homeowners in Scotland for energy efficiency and clean heating measures.	December 2022	Ongoing	N/A	As of October 2023, £64mn of funding has been awarded. Please note, this will include applications approved under the previous scheme iteration, but funding was paid since the launch of the new scheme.
Energy Saving Trust grant-funded activities 2023-24		April 2023	March 2024	£21.3m	£10m (Remaining budget will be allocated out over remainder of this financial year.)
Climate Action Hubs	Climate Action Hubs raise awareness of the climate crisis and support communities to work together and develop actions that can help them adapt to and tackle the impacts of climate change.	1 April 2023	2025/26	£15,900,000	£3,900,000
Human Rights Defenders Fellowship	Gender - allows human rights defenders from the Global South to spend several months in Scotland to rest, develop their work, skills and extend their networks in a safe place.	June 2023	31 March 2024	£50,000	£50,000
Climate Engagement Fund	The fund aims to build understanding of the climate emergency across communities, by offering support for climate engagement activities.	27 July 2023	Yet to be determined	£1,650,000	£565,000
Additional Human Rights Defenders	Gender - Human Rights Defender Fellowships - allows human rights defenders from other countries to spend several months in Scotland to rest, develop their work, skills and extend their networks in a safe place. We are currently supporting two woman from the Global South, this is for an additional fellowship.	July 2023	31 March 2024	£40,000	£40,000
Climate Just Communities	Climate Justice - Delivering interventions that build resilient and inclusive communities in Malawi, Rwanda & Zambia. Achieved via participatory actions to identify local priorities linked to the material and social impacts of climate change. Empowering the most marginalised within communities (including but not limited, gender, age, disability, status).	August 2023	2025/26	£24,000,000	£24,000,000
SCIAF - Storm Freddy	National frameworks research to identify opportunities for integrating ways to address losses and damages within national policies, and finance and planning frameworks and loss and damage Conference in Oct 2022.	September 2023	31 March 2024	£300,000	£300,000
Non Economic Loss and Damage - Climate Justice Resilience Fund	Loss and Damage - co-designed programme that is gender-responsive in addressing non-economic loss and damage impacts (NELD) caused by climate change. Multi country.	September 2023	2025/26	£5,000,000	£5,000,000
Warmer Homes Scotland	Scotland’s national fuel poverty scheme, designed to help those living in fuel poverty or at risk of fuel poverty through installing insulation and heating measures in to individual properties.	October 2023	02/10/2028 ‎ (with the option to extend by 2 years – 02/10/2030)	Maximum contract value of £728m (ex. VAT) if contract runs for 7 years and all additional scale up options are used.	£13.8m This represents funding allocated from the launch of phase 2 of the scheme in October 2023. Phase 1 ended on 29 November 2023.
C40 urban migration programme	Loss and Damage - to demonstrate how through inclusive climate action, cities can deliver climate justice for the most vulnerable residents - by building their resilience to climate impacts and addressing loss and damages they may face, promoting a just and fair transition.	October 2023	31 March 2024	£1,000,000	£1,000,000
GiveDirectly	Loss and Damage - to fund a partnership with GiveDirectly for social protection programmes in Malawi.	October 2023	31 March 2024	£1,000,000	£1,000,000
Humanitarian Emergency Fund	Loss and Damage - to fund loss and damage projects in Pakistan, Zambia, Kenya and Ethiopia through Scotland’s Humanitarian Emergency Fund, that are gender responsive.	December 2023	31 March 2024	£1,000,000	£1,000,000
Directorate for Environment and Forestry
Local air quality management 2023/24	Supports local authorities in undertaking the air quality monitoring and associated activities.	1999 (3)	Ongoing	£8.5 million	£7.7 million
Recycling Improvement Fund	Recycling Improvement Fund - capital funding grants for local authorities administered through ZWS to improve recycling infrastructure and services across Scotland.	April 2021	31 March 2026	£70 million	£60,336,984
Circular Textiles Fund	Delivery of Circular Textiles Fund - to help reduce the environmental impact of textiles. The fund aims to support the development of circular supply chains in Scotland.	June 2022	March 2024	£2,000,000	No funding was awarded financial year 22/23; ‎ Zero Waste Scotland are actively working with businesses to develop their proposals for FY 23/24
Nature Restoration Fund:	Supporting multi-year, multi-partner larger scale projects that will restore nature, safeguard wildlife and tackle the causes of biodiversity loss and climate change.	July 2021	Funding will be provided until end of FY 2025-26 under the current scheme, pending any decision to renew	£65 Million over the course of this Parliament (plus an additional £5 Million in 2023-24 to help develop Nature Networks)	£34 Million (plus £5 Million for Nature Networks)
General operating costs and delivery of clean air day 2023 in Scotland	General operating costs and delivery of clean air day 2023 in Scotland.	2017	Ongoing	£467,000	£467,000
Vehicle Emissions Testing Grant	Supports local authorities to undertake roadside emissions testing (to assess whether vehicles are meeting legal emissions standards) and enforce anti vehicle idling legislation to reduce air pollution, prioritising action at local hot spots.	2003 (3)	Ongoing	£10.5 million	£10.5 million
Air Quality Action Grant	Support for implementing local authority air quality action plan measures.	2008 (3)	Ongoing	£13.8 million	£12.48 million
Scottish Government Programmes of Research 2022-2027: Offer of Grant for Research Activity 2023-2024	Delivery of Research Projects within the Strategic Research Programme 2022-2027, Underpinning National Capacity, Knowledge Exchange and Management.	April 2023	March 2023	£38.1 million	£38.1 million
Scottish Government Programmes of Research: Responsive Research Fund	2023 BES Policy Fellowship Scheme & Support for the Multifunctional Landscapes Project in Scotland.	April 2023	Ongoing	£400,000	£347,000
Scottish Forum on Natural Capital 2023-24	To support the planned deliverables of the Forum.	April 2023	March 2024	N/A	2023/24 - £30,500
Development and delivery of Central Scotland Green Network (CSGN)	Delivery of Central Scotland Green Network (CSGN).	2009	Ongoing	N/A	£0.995m in 23/24
FIRNS (Facility for Investment Ready Nature in Scotlan	To help create a pipeline of market-ready projects to help attract responsible private investment in Scotland’s nature.	Announced February 2023, First Funding awards committed September 2023	March 2026	£1.8m SG/NatureScot £1.8m National Lottery Heritage Fund	£1.8m SG/NatureScot We do not hold NLHF data

(1)Figures provided are based on agreed Budgets. Future funding will be awarded to ongoing programmes on an annual basis.

(2)Funds are in the process of awarding further grants to applications that were received in the October application checkpoint.

(3)Figures provided from 2013 onwards.

Question reference: S6W-23918

Asked by: Maurice Golden, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 14 December 2023
Current Status: Answered by Gillian Martin on 21 December 2023

To ask the Scottish Government what assessment it has made regarding whether geographical diversity of energy infrastructure could enhance the adaptation and resilience of Scotland’s energy supply.

It is critical that Scotland’s energy system is resilient and that security of supply is maintained. We acknowledge that the location of infrastructure is an important factor in determining its contribution to the future security and resilience of our energy supply.

Our fourth National Planning Framework (NPF4) signals the key priorities for ‘where’ and ‘what’ development should take place at a national level. NPF4 places climate and nature at the centre of our planning system and makes clear that development proposals should be sited and designed to adapt to current and future risks from climate change.

The Scottish Government is broadly supportive of the proposal by the Electricity Networks Commissioner, Nick Winser, for a Strategic Spatial Energy Plan (SSEP). We are continuing to engage with the UK Government to ensure that as the SSEP is developed it fully takes into account Scotland's energy ambitions and respects devolved policy.

Question reference: S6W-23917

Asked by: Maurice Golden, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 14 December 2023
Current Status: Answered by Gillian Martin on 21 December 2023

To ask the Scottish Government what plans it has to monitor weather-related power system outages.

Security of electricity supply is reserved and a responsibility of the UK Government. It is delivered by the National Grid Electricity System Operator (ESO) under regulation from Ofgem.

National Grid ESO and the two electricity network operators in Scotland monitor, record and address any electricity outages at the transmission and distribution level. As such, the Scottish Government does not separately monitor weather-related power outages.

However, during disruptive events affecting electricity supplies, Scottish Government officials work closely with the UK Government and network operators as necessary, to understand impacts, restoration plans and the welfare of affected customers. If required, during severe weather events and associated power outages, the Scottish Government Resilience Room (SGoRR) may convene SGoR meetings with the attendance of network operators.

Question reference: S6W-23995

Asked by: Maurice Golden, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Monday, 18 December 2023
Current Status: Answered by Neil Gray on 20 December 2023

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide a breakdown by local authority area of investments made by the Scottish National Investment Bank in each year since it was established.

The Scottish National Investment Bank (the Bank) reports on the Scottish local authority areas that have benefitted from its investments through its annual Impact Report. The Impact Report 2023, setting out the impacts of the Bank’s investment to the close of 2022, showed that 20 of Scotland’s local authority areas had benefitted from the Bank’s investments. An update will be published in the Bank’s Impact Report 2024.

Furthermore, the Bank provides a representative map of its investment portfolio on the Bank’s portfolio webpage. However, it is important to note that although a Bank’s investee may be headquartered in a single location, the impact the investment is having can be further widespread.

Question reference: S6W-23919

Asked by: Maurice Golden, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 14 December 2023
Current Status: Answered by Neil Gray on 20 December 2023

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide a breakdown of installed renewable energy generation capacity by local authority area.

Electricity and heat capacity data broken down by local authority area are publicly available on the Scottish Energy Statistics Hub. Data tables can be found at the bottom of the following pages. Local authority data can be accessed by clicking the ‘Local authority’ tab above each data table.

Electricity: https://scotland.shinyapps.io/Energy/?Section=RenLowCarbon&Subsection=RenElec&Chart=RenElecCapacity

Heat: https://scotland.shinyapps.io/Energy/?Section=RenLowCarbon&Subsection=RenHeat&Chart=RenHeatTech

Question reference: S6W-23789

Asked by: Maurice Golden, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Monday, 11 December 2023
Current Status: Answered by Michael Matheson on 19 December 2023

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S6W-23282 by Michael Matheson on 7 December 2023, which NHS boards have (a) completed, (b) yet to complete and (c) yet to start their adaptation plans.

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