Permission has been granted to Beatice Offshore Windfarm Ltd (BOWL) to develop onshore transmission works for the project in Moray Firth.

A planning application was submitted to The Moray Council in April 2015 on behalf of the BOWL partnership.

Members of the council's Planning and Regulatory Services Committee approved the application on 02 November.

BOWL is a collaboration between SSE Renewables (50%), Repsol Nuevas Energias UK (25%) and Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners (25%).

An electricity substation will be built on a 13 hectare site at Blackhillock, near Keith, along with twin trenches carrying 200kV cables underground from Portgordon to Blackhillock.

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Offshore cabling from the windfarm will come ashore to the west of Portgordon and surface on farmland 150m inland.

Onshore cabling to the substation will be buried underground at a depth of 1.5m to 2m.

Horizontal directional drilling will be used to tunnel under watercourses, roads, the Aberdeen-Inverness railway line and the Keith-Dufftown railway line.

The project is expected to generate up to 664MW of renewable electricity if built.

Construction is expected to begin in 2016 subject to a positive Final Investment Decision next year.

Brian McFarlane, SSE's Director of Offshore Renewables, said: "SSE Renewables and our partners are delighted that members of The Moray Council's Planning and Regulatory Services Committee has granted Detailed Planning Permission for our onshore transmission works.

"The consent of our cable route marks another positive milestone in helping to deliver one of Scotland's most exciting engineering projects."

(LM/CD)