UK offshore wind Marine Recovery Funds start 17 Dec
From 17 December 2025, Marine Recovery Funds (MRFs) will switch on to help manage how offshore wind projects pay for environmental compensation. The Regulations were made on 24 November and laid before Parliament on 25 November, with the instrument signed by DEFRA minister Emma Hardy. These dates and details are recorded on legislation.gov.uk and GOV.UK respectively.
Think of an MRF as a simple exchange: you pay into a government‑run pot and, in return, the state delivers approved environmental measures to compensate for harm linked to your project. The legal power sits in section 292 of the Energy Act 2023, which sets out that payments go in for relevant offshore wind activities and payments come out to fund compensatory measures.
Who sets it up, and where does it apply? The Secretary of State can create one or more funds, either UK‑wide or for any mix of England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, and can decide which offshore wind activities a given fund covers.
Who pays-and why? If your development consent includes a compensation condition, you can apply to make an MRF payment. Before approval, the authority that imposed that condition must determine the extent to which your payment will discharge it. The Energy Act’s notes describe MRFs as an optional route for developers to meet such duties.
What counts as a ‘measure’? Measures are actions that compensate for adverse environmental effects-think restoring habitat or improving breeding success for affected species. Before any money can be spent, the Secretary of State must approve the measure, may limit its location or duration, and must publish a list of approved measures. Approval can also cover measures already delivered.
How the application works, step by step. You may start with an expression of interest, move to an initial agreement confirming you can proceed (often linked to obtaining consent), and pay a deposit to reserve all or part of an approved measure against your project. The Secretary of State can set application windows, allow transfers to another applicant in some cases, and abridge the process where consent has already been granted.
What happens if your application is approved. The Secretary of State allocates you an approved measure that matches the whole-or a defined part-of your compensation condition, sets the amount you must pay and the payment terms, and offers you an MRF contract. That contract names your project, the environmental effects being compensated, the condition itself, the allocated measure and its expected outcomes, plus how long monitoring will last.
Paying in and handing over delivery. Money can enter a fund from government, from applicants reserving a measure, or from participants under a signed contract. Once you pay the full amount or the first instalment, the Secretary of State becomes responsible for delivering the allocated measure in line with the contract.
What the fund can pay for. Payments out can cover developing new measures for approval, delivering all or part of an approved measure, acquiring measures that have already been delivered, and the costs of monitoring, adapting and decommissioning. During the monitoring period, the Secretary of State must track outcomes and can adapt, replace or add measures if that would better achieve the agreed results, before decommissioning when appropriate.
Fees and transparency. The Secretary of State can charge fees to recover running costs, link those fees to the estimated value of the approved measure, and make them non‑refundable. The application procedure and fee information must be published and updated so you can plan ahead.
Devolution and closure rules. Fund management can be delegated to a Scottish, Welsh or Northern Ireland public authority with the relevant ministers’ consent, and any cancellation of that delegation requires consultation. A fund set up for one territory can later be extended to others. If government proposes to close a fund to new applicants in a territory, it must consult the devolved ministers, and any consultation under these rules must last at least twelve weeks.
What this means for you now. Use the short window before 17 December to map any compensation conditions on your project, consider whether you prefer the MRF route over delivering your own compensatory action, and prepare material for an expression of interest. Keep watch for the published list of approved measures and the application windows. Once you sign an MRF contract and make your first payment, the state takes delivery responsibility and will monitor performance for the agreed period.