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Climate change is already having impacts on biodiversity within Europe, with habitats and species needing to change and adapt to rising global temperatures and shifts in bio-climatic zones.Spatial planning represents an important intervention to further European, national and local biodiversity objectives for climate change adaptation. Drawing on casestudies of plans for inland and coastal areas, and involving stakeholder workshops, this paper reports on a trans-national study examining the scope of spatial plans in the Netherlands, England and France in addressing the impact of climate change. It concludes that spatial planning is making provision for biodiversity and dynamic natural processes. However, while good practice in planning for biodiversity under conditions of climate change is developing, systematic use is not being made of available procedures. The paper examines some of the barriers to implementation of this new policy commitment to climate change adaptation. Recommendations are made covering policy development to include climate change impacts upon biodiversity, modifi ed procedures for plan-making and the appraisal of plans and projects. Amongst the specifi c measures recommended are the climate-proofi ng of projects and plans through the use of EIA and SEA; the integration of plans through adoption of common objectives and review of time horizons and boundaries; and an ecosystem-based planning approach.

Evidence is sought to identify barriers which may exist in the implementation of cumulative effects assessment (CEA). Cumulative effects may result from plans for the construction of clusters of large projects, or from gradual, piecemeal environmental change caused by numbers of individually small projects. Six CEA case studies are examined; the cases include windfarms, industrial developments, flood defence works and forestry projects. The study is based on documentary evidence plus interviews and survey involving all groups of interested stakeholders.The study shows that barriers to CEA include lack of information and guidance, resource and skill shortages and uncertainty about where the responsibilities for such work may lie. There is a gap between the developer's legislated responsibility for information provision and the breadth of information on cumulative effects that may be useful to the competent authority. Measures to overcome these barriers are suggested, including guidance studies (by sector or type of environment) and a re-consideration of funding and responsibility. Factors motivating CEA work are also noted.