The Environmental Assessment (Scotland) Act 2005 introduces a requirement to undertake ‘strategic' environmental assessment of most strategies, plans and programmes.
SEA is a systematic method which extends the assessment of environmental impact beyond individual projects. The Environmental Assessment (Scotland) Act 2005 came into effect in February 2006 and extends the scope of SEA in Scotland beyond the provisions of the European Union Directive 2001/42/EC to include strategies as well as plans and programmes.
In September 2006 the Scottish Government launched the SEA toolkit. The aim of the toolkit is to provide advice on the requirements of the Environmental Assessment (Scotland) Act 2005. The toolkit gives guidance on when a SEA will be required, practical advice on how to do a SEA and templates for each stage of the report writing process.
Further information and guidance on the SEA process can be obtained from http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Top
