Scotland's percentage of GB coastline: EIR release

Information requested

What is Scotland's % of GB coastline?

Response

As the information you have requested is ‘environmental information’ for the purposes of the Environmental Information (Scotland) Regulations 2004 (EIRs), we are required to deal with your request under those Regulations. We are applying the exemption at section 39(2) of the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002 (FOISA), so that we do not also have to deal with your request under FOISA.

This exemption is subject to the ‘public interest test’. Therefore, taking account of all the circumstances of this case, we have considered if the public interest in disclosing the information outweighs the public interest in applying the exemption. We have found that, on balance, the public interest lies in favour of upholding the exemption, because there is no public interest in dealing with the same request under two different regimes. This is essentially a technical point and has no material effect on the outcome of your request.

Response to your request

The answer to your question is that Scottish Government estimates Scotland's % of GB coastline is 59%. This figure was derived in 2010. A check against the high water mark (Mean High Water MHW / Mean High Water Springs MHWS) extracted from a copy of the Ordnance Survey Boundary Line dataset (https://www.ordnancesurvey.co.uk/products/boundary-line) (dated 2017) yields the same figure. Please note that all measurements of coastlines are subject to the coastline paradox (as highlighted on the Facts and Figures page) (https://marine.gov.scot/data/facts-and-figures-about-scotlands-sea-areacoastline- length-sea-area-sq-kms).

About FOI

The Scottish Government is committed to publishing all information released in response to Freedom of Information requests. View all FOI responses at http://www.gov.scot/foi-responses.