Scaled back plan for the spaceport on North Uist
Iain Stephen Morrison
Spaceport 1 is now to be developed on a much smaller scale than outlined when plans were first revealed to the community in 2019.
Last night (17th November 2021) consultants presented the initial conclusions of an environmental impact assessment at an information session hosted online on Teams.
It was confirmed that the spaceport would, if planning permission is granted, be developed to focus entirely on suborbital launches using smaller vehicles, reducing the need for significant infrastructure on the proposed site at Scolpaig.
Comhairle nan Eilean Siar is developing Spaceport 1 in partnership with organisations including Hebrides Range operator QinetiQ.
Consultants working on the environmental impact assessment on behalf of the Spaceport 1 consortium, Laura Carse from Western Isles Marine and Environment and Sarah Murray from Aquatera, explained at the meeting last night that due to the reduced size of the development, there will be no serious adverse impact on the environment at Scolpaig.
Initial plans for Spaceport 1 featured multiple buildings, two launch pads and access tracks to the north of the site on Scolpaig Farm.
Since then the proposed development has been substantially reduced and is now focussed on providing a permanent venue for launching smaller suborbital launch vehicles. It will be the sole location in the UK with an exclusive focus on the niche suborbital market, while other sites are set to concentrate on the orbital market, such as Shetland and Sutherland.
It was stressed that plans presented last night represent a standalone, permanent project and not part of a phased development.
Existing infrastructure will be used as much as possible, with around 700m of track upgraded, improvements carried out on the culvert under the Loch Scolpaig causeway and one of the farm buildings redeveloped to act as a storage, workshop and communications centre. New infrastructure will comprise additional access tracks, a hardstanding area within the farmstead complex, a launchpad hardstanding area and a concreted launchpad with an integrated pollution control and containment system.
It is also proposed to create additional parking spaces on the site for public access.
“So the spaceport will essentially function as a licensed venue for individual launch operators to marshal their own operations. Each launch operator will have their own bespoke infrastructure and equipment to support their own launch event,” explained Sarah Murray.
Members of the public who attended the online information session last night were provided visualisations of the kind of infrastructure that could appear on site (see image above) for the largest class of vehicle that could be launched from Spaceport 1.
Local residents were advised that the sort on equipment and infrastructure that could be seen on site around launch dates might include support vehicles, welfare units, containerised fuelling systems and command or control systems
“Each launch event will be quite self contained and based around portable units,” added Laura Carse.
Infrastructure most likely to be visible in the landscape will be the temporary launch infrastructure, advised the consultants, including the launch vehicle, launch tower and container units.
Infrastructure could be visible for as little as one day or a couple of days at the most.
Up to ten launches a year will be undertaken at the spaceport by a range of operators, with launch vehicles of varying specifications.
Despite the reduction in the scale of the spaceport development, members of the community were advised last night that there was still an expectation that 25 direct positions of employment would be created on North Uist.
Consultants are working to finalise the environmental impact assessment report over the coming weeks and a planning application, with the report and accompanying technical information, will be submitted to the planning authority for consideration. Documents will be available to view on the online planning portal, which can be found on the website of Comhairle nan Eilean Siar.
