How to Hide a 395-Acre Oil Terminal Moa Karolina Carlsson PhD Candidate in Architecture Massachusetts Institute of Technology, MIT [email protected]

abstract Examining the evolution of ’s oil handling terminal on the island of in Scottish (1972-1978) reveals how a new planning procedure was invented to justify a controversial industrial development in a seemingly undisturbed scenic landscape. One of the UK’s first Environmental Impact Assessments (EIA) was undertaken with a specific focus on visual amenity. To reduce the visual impact of the 395-acre facility in the island’s flat moor landscape, techniques of computerized visual analysis were developed. The article thus traces the invention of a new digital technology designed to simulate human visual perception by replacing the observing subject with a “seeing” algorithm. The significance of its use in the terminal project is the advent of one of Britain's most widely used tools for planning and development control: Visual Impact Analysis (VIA). Ultimately the article argues that the VIA of the proposed terminal on Flotta served as the official justification for a planning decision that had already been granted.

Introduction Since the early 1970s, planners and policymakers have come to recognize scientific methods for making decisions on new developments in the British countryside. This approach has proven particularly fruitful in locations where competing visions of the landscape (for example those held by pro-industry and nature conservation groups) have turned developments into issues of public controversy. Systematic, repeatable methods often produce information that allow decision-makers to legitimate their preferred outcomes by relying on scientific, or pseudoscientific, facts.1 Most established landscape analysis techniques were developed for specific projects such as the siting of power stations, transmission lines, roads and other large projects, and typically involve the use of perspective drawings, scale models and photomontages. Photomontage techniques may include superimposed photographs or projected images in order to present a better visual appreciation of a proposed development scheme prior to construction. More recently, digital computer mapping and graphics are employed to more accurately simulate

1 As Brian Martin and Evelleen Richards point out, this process is typically far from a frictionless. See, Scientific knowledge, controversy, and public decision-making. In Sheila Jasanoff, Gerald E. Markle, James C. Petersen, and Trevor Pinch (Eds.), Handbook of Science and Technology Studies (Newbury Park, CA: Sage, 1995): 506-526.

1 the visual intrusion of a development in a landscape. These picture-making techniques are mainly designed to enable impacts to be visualized but do not justify the location of the development.

This article focuses on the evolution and early experiments with a different kind of digital technology that promises to simulate without subjective bias visual changes in landscape caused by a new development – a claim that gives the produced outcome mandate to serve as proxy for human visual perception in the planning control process. Visual Impact Analysis (VIA), as the technology is commonly called, involves a procedure invented to precisely and geometrically determine and control who can see what from defined locations in the built environment. It produces maps not only of landscape but renders visible the extent (uninterrupted area) of a human observer’s visual field, positioned therein. Consistent with Daston and Galison’s notion of “mechanical objectivity,”2 this endeavour deliberately replaces the observing subject (and thus aims to get rid of inevitable bias and unpredictability) with an explicit and repeatable procedure that allows the “nature [of landscape] to speak for itself.”3 It measures, so to speak, the quantity of “seeing” or of visual changes allegedly without the bias characteristic of the empirical gaze. The adoption of this technology in countryside planning ultimately renders the act of seeing landscape as a disembodied, veridical, and realistic process of classifying the world according to that “in view” and that “out of view.” Challenging this reduction of human visual perception into a binary condition (digitally represented as 0/1), this paper illuminate that questions of who can see what from where in the built environment --- or more recently: what can see what4 --- for what purpose, and for whose benefit or gain is arguably a through-and-through political project with very high stakes, particularly for the individual. In my formulation, the possibility for

2 Lorraine Daston and Peter Galison, “The Image of Objectivity,” Representations 40 (1992): 81–128; Lorraine Daston and Peter Galison, Objectivity (New York: Zone Books, 2007). 3 Daston and Galison, “The Image of Objectivity” (1992, 81). 4 Today, integration of technologies of this type is becoming more widespread and invisible in different sectors of society. Automated or semi-automated processes of machine and computer vision are used, for example, in surveillance and predictive analytics, in law enforcement to identify suspected criminals, and in developments of self-driving vehicles. In design and environmental planning, a semi-automated procedure known as Landscape and Visual Impact Assessment (LVIA) has become a widely adopted tool to analyze potential visual impacts to landscape and landscape views resulting from proposed developments or management actions. (See, for example, Guidelines for Landscape and Visual Impact Assessment 3rd edition, 2013.) Similarly, so called, viewshed or isovist analysis are common functions of most geographic information system (GIS) software. The technology is often used to assist in planning deliberations and to preserve strategic view corridors in the built environment.

2 individuals to independently interpret visual stimuli is not simply a cognitive or artistic idea but one arguably essential to individualism, transgression of norms, and delight.5

To substantiate this claim, I examine how techniques of visual analysis and simulation were invented and put to use in one of the UK’s first Environmental Impact Assessments (EIA)6 undertaken for the development of a 395-acre oil handling terminal on the island of Flotta off the northern coast of the Scottish mainland. While an EIA is designed to consider many different aspects of landscape, the process known as and Visual Impact Assessment (VIA) is put in place to “ensure that effects of change and development both on landscapes and on landscape views, are taken into consideration in formal decision-making processes.”7 However, as Brian Clark et al point out, there is an intrinsic difference between impact analysis on the one hand and assessment and evaluation on the other.8 In EIA matrices are used to systematically record environmental impacts but these matrices are themselves not comparable. Arguably, one main idea of EIA was that the procedure would complement cost-benefit-analysis by providing means of assessing non-quantifiable environmental factors. Thus, the task still remains of comparing and judging one matrix against the others, the only way which is trained judgement. In the case of VIA the distinction between “mechanical objectivity” and trained judgement is even less clear because the digital procedure has already been programmed to undertake a particular way of “human” seeing.

The central problem in focus is thus not that digital computers replaced human beings in 1970s planning debates, although this was arguably often the case, but rather that digital “seeing” became understood as empirical measurement processes that sufficiently epitomize human vision. The consequence of replacing an observing subject with a seeing algorithm is that human interpretation and evaluation of visual content, what Nelson Goodman calls “worldmaking,”9

5 Leon Battista Alberti, De Architectura (“On architecture”, published as Ten Books on Architecture). 6 The basis of Environmental Impact Assessment is a procedure that seeks to ensure that the environmental implications of decisions are taken into account before the decisions are made. 7 In the UK, the current approach and methodology to visual impact assessment is set out in a Department of Environment (DoE) ‘Blue Book’, entitled Guidelines for Landscape and Visual Impact Assessment (GLIVA). The first edition of these guidelines, GLIVA1, published in 1995, was co-produced by the Landscape Institute and the Institute of Environmental Management and Assessment. 8 Brian Clark et al. 1981. Assessment of Major Developments. 9 Ways of Worldmaking (1978).

3 come to play no role in matters that ultimately concern the public. This gives rise to a dilemma where, despite the rhetoric of visual perception that surrounds VIA and its claim to simulate what a person can see from a defined location, human beings are effectively removed from decision- making processes. As I will demonstrate, this was indeed often an explicit goal of the early computerized experiments, or as Mark Turnbull and Graeme Aylward who developed digital computing aids for the Flotta terminal put it: “any approach for assessing the visual impact of a new development should remove the uncertainty of individual judgement so far as the presentation of evidence for visibility is concerned.”10 Thus, this article examines the emergence of a new vision-based technology that promised to quantify changes in visual amenity11 and to simulate visual prospects that allegedly match those perceived by a human being. After a presentation of how the Flotta terminal developed from an initial idea to a fully functioning oil refining facility, still in full use four decades later - I conclude by speculating on the significance of the VIA and EIA procedures in bringing the terminal to construction. My hypothesis is that the VIA and the EIA served, above all, a symbolic function in that one of their main roles was arguably to, at practically any cost, avoid a public inquiry. I deliberately use the word “cost” to allude to my conclusion: that what really got the Flotta oil handling terminal built was different powerful tool in development: money. In other words, the VIA and EIA were primarily used to produce the information that the Occidental Consortium12 (the developer) needed to justify the substantial transformation of Flotta that would bring substantial revenue to both Occidental and the British government.

Transforming Flotta “Orkney possesses an outstandingly beautiful landscape. This is not achieved through contrasting and diverse topographic structures and ground cover, but through the complex permutations of simple forms… The greys of the stone,

101982. “Visual Impact Analysis” in Alan Pipes (Ed.) CAD82: 5th International Conference and Exhibition on Computers in Design Engineering (Guildford: Butterworth & Co. Ltd.): 229. 11 The term “visual amenity” first appeared in the 1957 Electricity Act and has since generally been construed as the visual elements that contribute to the overall character or enjoyment of an area. This vague definition renders visual amenity a complex and highly controversial issue in British planning control and policy. The complexity arises from its dual meaning as a resource that, as most other natural resources, can be measured in quantitative terms while simultaneously constituting a qualitative and intangible resource defined though human observation, interpretation, and evaluation. 12 In 1972, the Occidental North Sea Consortium comprised of four oil companies: Occidental of Britain Inc., Getty Oil International Ltd., Union Texas North Sea Ltd, and Thompson Scottish Petroleum Ltd.

4 the browns and mauves of moorland, the rich greens of pastureland and the soft blues of the seas render a landscape of powerfully subtle variations.”13 [Fig. 1]

In a language that may connote poet Robert Burns rather than an international oil corporation, the paragraph is taken from an Environmental Impact Statement produced in 1974 by the Occidental North Sea Consortium (hereafter “Occidental”) for a development on Flotta. Three years later, amidst the seemingly undisturbed island landscape, a 395-acre oil handling terminal has just appeared covering 1/6 the island. Designed to handle a throughput of 250,000 barrels per day, the development comprises five 500,000-barrel storage tanks; two deballast tanks; processing facilities; service buildings; two single-point moorings; a loading jetty and a network of pipelines.14 This article tells a history of this substantial landscape transformation by examining a team of landscape architects that helped Occidental conceive a major industrial facility in the middle of rural Orkney.

In certain respects, my account of the Flotta oil handling terminal challenges the dominant historical accounts. In the literature on the development, the terminal is widely considered a great planning success much due to its creators’ thorough engagement with impacts on the natural environment, and rapid and allegedly trouble-free progression from outline planning permission to a working facility. Five years after the first oil arrived through the pipes on Flotta, Graeme Lapsley, Chief Executive of the Orkney County Council who played a major role in its development, was full of praise: “Flotta is as near a thing of beauty as an oil terminal can be, and it has won international acclaim as a model of what can be achieved by a good relationship between a local authority and a developer.”15 According to Lapsley, the oil terminal brought a number of benefits to Flotta, including new housing, a school, improved community facilities, improved fresh water supply, an air-strip, improved piers, better roads, mains electricity, a better ferry service, and local employment prospects.16 The terminal is often upheld as an exemplary for sustainable development, evident in it being granted a civic trust award in 1982, as well as

13 William J. Cairns, Occidental Petroleum, Flotta Orkney Oil Handling Terminal, Report 2 (1974, 1-3). 14 Subsequently two additional 950,000-barrel storage tanks were added for development of the Claymore oil field discovered later. 15 “The Community Impact of ”, in William Cairns (eds. Onshore Impacts of Offshore Oil 16 Lapsley (1981): 181-182.

5 number of environmental and safety awards.17 In this article I trace the visual impact studies undertaken to secure its planning permission. Specifically, I examine the invention of a new kind of planning evidence used to support the view that the seemingly undisturbed landscape of Flotta possessed sufficient capacity to receive a major development without irrevocably altering its character. This new evidence was produced using a digital computer, which allegedly was able to simulate what people can see, as a matter of fact, from particular locations in the environment. These digital proxies for human visual perception (charts, maps, and elevation- and perspective views) were used to define the design measures taken to harmonize the scale of the new development and to secure its integration with its environment. In other words, with the help of the digital computer, Occidental was able to produce some of the evidence they needed to justify the terminal’s construction. Taking a fresh look on the Flotta oil terminal development thus provides a technological “window” through which to view how human empirical vision was replaced by the allegedly more reliable18 virtues of clarity, repeatability, and accuracy. However, as no computer arguably sees the way a human being does, I argue that one needs to ask what exactly was (and still is!) being invoked with the language of vision, in relation to these “seeing” applications.

EIA Crosses the Atlantic Conflicts between people’s desire to preserve the natural landscape and their desire to improve their standard of living (necessitating, for example, increase in electricity and petroleum generation) have existed for centuries. In the second half of the twentieth century institutional and statutory mechanisms were invented that enable these conflicts to be heard, discussed, and acted upon. The UK’s Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) procedure - modelled on that in the United States - is one means to this end. In the US, EIA has strong legislative basis. It came into being with the National Environmental Policy Act of 1969 (NEPA), which set out a procedure of technical evaluation intended to contribute to more “objective” decision making. The NEPA was passed by Congress in December 1969 and signed by President Nixon in January

17 A list of the recognitions and awards can be found in a brochure produced by “Oxy”, entitled Flotta Oil Handling Terminal Orkney, Civic trust Premier Award Winner 1982. 18 For an discussion on the concept of “reliability” in the Cold War era, see Edward Jones-Imhotep’s The Unreliable Nation: Hostile Nature and Technological Failure in the Cold War. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

6 1970. Following a directive from the European Union,19 EIA was formally introduced in the UK in 1988 through inclusion in the Town and Country Planning Regulations for England and Wales, and in Environmental Assessment Regulations for and Northern Ireland.20 With these regulations, EIA became a statutory requirement in the UK for certain types of projects, typically large-scale developments or those with potentially significant environmental effects, such as airports, oil refineries, or motorways. The directive requires that a detailed statement of project and product impacts be prepared and presented to decision-makers before decisions are taken. The benefits and shortcomings of EIA in the UK have been discussed in detail elsewhere.21 A common view presented in this literature is that while UK formally adopted EIA nearly two decades after the US, legislation targeting monitoring of changes and protection of the environment have been a central concern in the UK planning system at least since the Town and Country Planning Act 1947.

Since 1947 Britain had nationalized planning rights, which means that anyone wishing to erect a building must seek permission from the authorities. One reason for the (in comparison with the US) late introduction of EIA in Great Britain is widely held to be that concern for the natural environment was already addressed in a number of planning Acts.22 In practice, before EIA was introduces, this meant that it was up to each planning authority to decide how much information was required for each planning application. In effect, the EIA directive of 1988 served to mobilize under a new rubric already existing efforts, traditionally referred to as “site location and

19 European EIA Directive (85/337/EEC). 20 Two UK research projects pre-empted the adaption of EIA. See, J Catlow and C G Thirlwall (1976) Environmental lmpact Analysis, DOE Research Report 11 (London: HMSO); and B D Clark, K Chapman, R Bisset, P Wathern. and M Barrat (1981) A Manual for the Assessment of Major Development Proposals (London: HMSO). This was a successor to B D Clark et al (1976) Assessment of Major lndustrial Applications: A Manual: DOE Research Report 13 (London: HMSO). 21 See for example, Peter Hall “Environmental Impact Analysis – Scientific tool or Philosopher’s Stone?” Built Environment, Vol 4, No 2, 1978: 84-86.; Built Environment 1978. Special issue on Environmental Impact Analysis, 4: 85-160.; John Sheail, An Environmental History of Twentieth-Century Britain (New York: Palgrave, 2002); Timothy O’Riordan “Beware binding commitments: The British approach to EIA” Environmental Impact Assessment Review Volume 2, Issue 1, March 1981: 89-102. 22 In 1931, the UK government-appointed Addison Committee proposed that particularly scenic areas be given official protection as National Parks. With the outbreak of WWII, the process was delayed. In 1945, the Dower Report recommended areas to be designated, and in 1947 the Hobhouse Report outlined details for their implementation. Finally, after the Parliament approved the National Parks and Access to the Countryside Act of 1949, the first ten National Parks were officially designated. However, the 1949 Act concerned only areas of special interest, not the vast stretches of rural Britain where most planning battles were fought.

7 assessment procedures.”23 Only in a public inquiry, that is, a legal device by which objectors to a proposed plan can air their views, may the opportunity arise for public questioning of how such consultations were taken into account. For this reason, many lobbied for EIA to be introduced providing clearer and more explicit guidelines.

Discussions on incorporating EIA in project assessment had begun in the early seventies in Scotland where planners were concerned that the wider repercussions of large oil development related schemes (oil refineries, petroleum refinery complexes, natural gas transmission stations) were too great for the local planning authorities to handle without guidance.24 It was clear that in the rural areas, where many of the early applications were made, planning authorities were not accustomed to handling projects of this complexity. As the North Sea oil developments gained momentum in the early 1970s, the Scottish Development Department (SDD) encouraged large oil and gas corporations to collaborate with local planning authorities in establishing such guidelines.25 This led to a number of privately financed EIAs of which one of the most well- known is that commissioned for the Sullum Voe terminal on the Islands in 1976.26 A few years earlier, what was likely one of the first EIAs to be undertaken in the UK was commissioned for the oil handling terminal on Flotta. With these projects, EIAs became associated with large development schemes and has remained so ever since.

Treasure Island Oil was first found beneath the central part of the North Sea in December 1969. Having entered the international oil scene in Libya in 1966, American Occidental Petroleum established its North Sea Consortium in 1971. While the name Occidental, or “Oxy”, might not be familiar, the tragic history of the oil platform might ring a bell. In 1988, the rig exploded

23 F.E. Dean “St Fergus: Visual and Design Considerations” In William J, Cairns and Patrick M. Rogers (Eds.) Onshore Impacts of Offshore Oil (1981): 146. 24 O’Riordan “EIA in Britain” (1989, 94). 25 In a 1974 report to the Oil Development Council for Scotland, the members of the ‘Committee on the Environment Report to the Oil Development Council for Scotland’ recommend that impact analyses be undertaken for all major oil developments and that these should consider both short-term and long-term impact on the environment and on local communities. The impact analysis oil platform at Lock Carron undertaken by SPHERE Environmental Consultants in August 1973 is highlighted as a successful precursor. See, North Sea Oil and the Environment. 1974. (Edinburgh: Her Majesty’s Stationary Office), 13. 26 Environmental Advisory Group Oil terminal at Sullom Voe: Environmental Impact Assessment. (Sandwick, Shetland: Thuleprint Ltd, 1976).

8 resulting in the loss of 167 lives. A decade and a half prior, in 1972, Occidental obtained a license to drill in the North Sea. After seismically mapping their assigned “blocks,”27 the first discovery well with commercial potential was drilled by a rig called “Ocean Victoria”28 in January 1973. The discovery was considered of sufficient promise to warrant a field name: Piper. [Fig. 2] By October, sufficient appraisal wells had been drilled to estimate the reserve of recoverable oil at 642 million barrels.29 Shortly thereafter, a second field, given the name “Claymore” was discovered, estimated to give an additional 410 million barrels. The combined resources of Piper and Claymore, gave Occidental the third largest position in the UK North Sea at this time.

The story of the Flotta terminal began in 1973 when, out of nine sites, Flotta was chosen as landfall for oil drilled at Piper. Its location as a natural harbour in , given some protection form the often-adverse weather conditions, rendered Flotta a suitable location for the new terminal.30 According to Graeme Lapsley, in the transformation of Flotta, “an ex-naval anchorage was transformed into a major oil port with the physical development of the Flotta terminal.”31 During both WWI and WWII, the island served as a navy base, which had left it with numerous piers, abandoned facilities, and shipwrecks. As has been widely discussed elsewhere,32 on June 17th, 1919, the Germans officers gave order to scuttled more than 70 ships of their High Seas Fleet in Scapa Flow, just outside of Flotta; many of which still remain. In their planning application for the terminal, Occidental made several mentions of the island’s military past seemingly to allude to the fact that, during the war years, the island had already been invaded and thoroughly transformed.

To secure planning permission, a major change in zoning was required that would re-designate Flotta, traditionally farming and grazing land, for industrial use. At the time when Occidental

27 Following the 1958 Continental shelf convention, geographic “block” areas constitute the agreed units for licensing within each country’s exclusive economic zone. 28 Occidental, The Flotta Story (1977, 9). 29 Ibid. 30 Scapa Flow has been used as a harbour since Viking times. Its name “Skalpaflói” was given to it by the Vikings. 31 Graeme Lapsley, “The Community Impact of North Sea Oil” (1981), 173. 32 For a detailed historical account of these events, see Arthur Marder’s five volume series From the Dreadnought to Scapa Flow (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1961-1969).

9 selected Flotta as landfall for oil drilled at Piper, more than 70% of the island was used for agriculture, including rearing of livestock, rough grazing and grass production. The power to control this designation, and ultimately to grant planning approval, lied in the hands of Orkney County Council, who as of 1974 was the official Harbour Authority for Scapa Flow.33 Both the Council and Occidental closely followed developments in Shetland, where negotiations of oil developments were already underway. One major difference was that in Orkney the Council dealt with a consortium of only four oil companies, versus in Shetland the number was much greater. On an early trip to Flotta, Graham Lapsley supposedly told the team from Occidental, led by American businessman Armand Hammer, that obtaining planning permission would come at a price: “if you are going to land [the oil] here you will have to pay.”34 For Occidental, there was one major catch: the company had severe cash flow problems and thus could not afford to face a public inquiry.35 Public inquiries often lasted several years and were to be paid for by the developer. Under Scottish law, a public inquiry was required if a proposed development received four formal objections. Thus, to gain the local population’s approval Occidental assembled a public relations (PR) team under the leadership of Timothy Halford. To serve as the main link between Occidental, the Council and the local community, Occidental hired Bill Crichton, an Orcadian and local schoolteacher. With his help, a (to the community) favourable price per acre36 was negotiated with landowners, which gave Flotta the nickname “treasure island” in the national press. [Fig. 3] The Council and the local community knew that Occidental had made money from drilling oil in Libya and elsewhere and were simultaneously aware of the favourable deals being made in Shetland. Presented with the opportunity, they asked Occidental to pay for numerous and wide-spanning claims that allegedly ranged from a community centre and a new arts centre (Pier Arts in ), to an archaeological survey of Orkney and a grand piano.37 Put bluntly, the oil company effectively purchased the public’s approval. The strategy worked

33 Letter from K. G. Evans (Min. of Defence, Naval Construction Research Establishment) to Captain D. J. Bent (Queen’s Harbour Master). 22 May, 1974. National Archives Kew (POWE 63/1175) 34 Timothy Halford recalls this event in his oral history that is part of the Lives in the Oil Industry project: Halford, Timothy W. Interview by Hugo Manson. Part of Lives in the Oil Industry. November 22, 2000, in London, UK. University of Aberdeen/British Library. 35 Ibid. 36 According to David Sinclair, a local resident at the time, the agreed price was £1500 per acre. Sinclair, David Francis. Interview by Hugo Manson. Part of Lives in the Oil Industry. Monday 3 November 2003, in Flotta, Scotland. University of Aberdeen/British Library. 37 Halford, Timothy W. Interview. November 22, 2000. University of Aberdeen/British Library.

10 and Occidental escaped a public inquiry by one vote. In part, the enthusiasm for the terminal was due to the promise of new jobs and expanded services – opportunities that, it was envisioned, would enable young people to stay on the island and render it more attractive to immigration. The population of Flotta had been steadily decreasing from 425 in 1881, to only 73 in 1971.38 Capitalizing on Flotta’s demographic predicament, Occidental’s made it their policy to fill 100 out of the estimated 150 new jobs with Orcadians.39 Having purchased the land required for the terminal, Occidental sold it back to the Council, and the process of preparing the planning application began.40

Visual Amenity in the Flotta EIA In January 1974, only one year after the initial discovery of oil at Piper, outline planning permission for the new oil handling terminal was granted without need for a public inquiry.41 Although the development was agreed in principle, the Orkney County Council demanded a selection of issues of concern to be further examined, including the visual, marine, and socio- economic impacts.42 The Council set 18 conditions out that required detailed submission and approval. These conditions ensured that the local authority controlled all stages of the development, and to guarantee that suitable measures were taken to minimize its environmental impacts. 12 of the 18 conditions concerned environmental and design aspects. In 1973, Occidental had hired Cairns and Associates, an Edinburgh planning and design firm, as environmental advisors and landscape architects. In the words of “Bill” Cairns, “the problem that emerges is one of fitting into a predominantly flat, exposed, rural landscape, a major industrial development with component parts alien to that landscape.”43 The stated conditions include the design and layout of buildings including colour and appearance; a landscape scheme for surface grading, earth mounds, screening trees, walls and fences, and their maintenance; siting, design and layout of any temporary accommodation camps; and termination of use of the land, removal of buildings, plant and structures, and reinstatement within 12 months of the end of operations on

38 The Flotta Story (1977, 3). 39 Ibid. 40 Graeme Lapsley, “The Community Impact of North Sea Oil” (1981): 175. 41 Occidental’s outline planning permission was submitted to the Orkney County Council in July 1973. 42 Sargent “Flotta Terminal” In William J, Cairns and Patrick M. Rogers (Eds.) Onshore Impacts of Offshore Oil (1981), 157. 43 Cairns and Associates, December 1973.

11 the site.44 To satisfy these requirements, the Council, the Scottish Development Department, the Highlands and Islands Development Boards, The Department of Environment, the Navy, and the Ports Directorate agreed that a, so called, “Environmental Impact Statement” 45 would greatly strengthen Occidental’s planning application, and that such should be modelled on the system used in the United States. The general idea was that a number of detailed studies would provide a “secure factual basis”46 from which the impact of the proposed terminal would be considered. Key environmental factors understood to be affected by the proposal included local geology, climate, drainage, soils, vegetation, wild life, marine ecology, settlement, demography, employment, infrastructure, and land use.47 Based on initial reports, the Orkney County Council confirmed two sensitive areas for in-depth analysis: (1) impacts on the marine environment and (2) the problem of effective visual integration of the terminal into the landscape. To integrate a large industrial facility in the typically flat landscape in Orkney presented a major design problem, and thus the visual impact caused by the development became a major concern for Occidental.48

Computing Visual Intrusions Their task placed on William Cairns was to conduct a comprehensive visual impact analysis, which would result in a statement of policy intent with regards to visual amenity. The goal was to minimize the terminal’s visibility as viewed from adjacent islands and from the air. Flotta was directly under a commercial flight path to Airport, and it was estimated that, when travelling in an airplane along the path, Flotta was fully exposed for about three minutes. Having undertaken some initial studies, Cairns and his team concluded that to conceal the 395-acre facility, in the predominantly flat moor landscape of Flotta, presented a challenge. Hiding the

44 Sargent “Flotta Terminal” 1981: 158-159. 45 Letter from K. G. Evans to Captain D. J. Bent. National Archives Kew (POWE 63/1175). 46 Occidental The Flotta Story. 1977, 14. 47 A staged Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) was integrated with the terminal design process and executed in five stages: (1) project proposal; (2) environmental assessment; (3) visual impact analysis and landscape proposals; (4) marine ecosystem impact and protection proposals; and (5) terminal operation manual. See Sargent “Flotta Terminal” 1981: 156-157. 48 The focus on visual resources was prompted by changes underway in landscape designation at a national scale. The year after Flotta opened, forty National Scenic Areas (what in England are called AONBs) were identified by the Countryside Commission for Scotland. Hence, the focus on visual aspects of the terminal on Flotta aligned with a wider debate concerning what landscapes should receive statutory protection, and how such decisions were best taken.

12 terminal, they cautioned, was not a viable option: “It is not reasonable to expect that an oil terminal can be completely hidden from view.”49 Instead, the design team noted, the aim must be to enable the terminal to blend into the landscape, that is, to achieve “a harmonious relationship of the new Terminal with the visual environs of Flotta.”50 To manipulate the visibility around the terminal a two-punch approach was selected: intervisibility (i.e. the study of areas of terrain that allow observation from one to another) and camouflage.

To decide how to best conceal the terminal in its environments, the design team decided to find out which physical and physiological factors influence the degree to which things stand out to the eye. The visual criteria studied included profile of tanks and building, bulk, edge delineation, overlap of forms, depth of field, and colour. To examine exposure and intervisibility of the terminal, analyses were carried out using a method developed by Ronald Hebblethwaite, architect at the Central Electricity Generating Board. Hebblethwaite’s method constituted a way to cartographically map the extent of terrain visible from a defined location, covering a 360- degree panorama.51 Sections and height calculations were used to find the boundary of the landscape in view, what he called the “Zone of Visual Influence” or “ZVI.”52

To put Hebblethwaite’s method into practice, Cairns sought advice from landscape architect Mark Turnbull and architect Graeme Aylwayd, pioneers of computer-aided landscape design and visual analysis. Under their leadership, the work at Flotta began by identifying view cones of site visibility within which the terminal was expected to be visible to boaters in Scapa Flow, and to motorists on public roads on the adjacent islands. Panoramic photographs were taken from representative viewpoints within each view cone and from the air, to study variations in scale, form, profile, shape, massing and colour of the terminal component parts. In addition, physical models of the island were built at scale 1:1000 and 1:5000, and each model layout was photographed from sea level foreground, middle ground and background positions. [Fig. 4] Each

49 Cairns and Associates, December 1973. 50 Cairns 1973, 4 51 R.L. Hebblethwaite. Landscape Assessment: Qualitative Zones of Visual Influence and Quantitative. 1966. AD THO B/9. Landscape Institute archive and library. University of Reading, UK. 52 Zone of Theoretical Visibility (ZTV) analysis is the process of determining the visibility of an object in the surrounding landscape and illustrates the potential (or theoretical) visibility of an object in the landscape, based on topography.

13 terminal proposal was measured against three criteria that sought to minimize “edge” definition; diminish “depth of field” recognition; and to maximize visual “overlap.”53 It was found that the hills on southern Flotta, and the mountains on neighbouring island provided some backcloth for the terminal, which would make the terminal better blend in with the landscape. The site was most exposed from the North with views ranging from five to eight miles. This finding prompted the introduction of earthworks to provide an artificial skyline to screen the development.

Mathematizing the Eye As views of the site were considered at many scales, Turnbull and Aylward developed a computer program, based on Hebblethwaite’s method, to automate the mapping of zones from which the terminal would be visible. The program was designed to answer the question: “Can the components of the development be seen or not?”54 Topography was considered the main element in simulating the visibility of a site and it was expressed numerically as elevation values at the intersecting points of a two-dimensional grid. A view point could be expressed as a height above a known elevation at a specified grid point, and lines of sight originating from it could be generated at all other elevations of grid points to test for visibility from that point. In sum, the landscape question had been reconfigured as binary, requiring a simple yes/no answer. According to the designers:

“Visibility can be quantified, so the task is to find the most flexible and accurate method by which it can be determined and expressed. The method of analysis will not provide a design, but if it is effective in simulating alternatives a much more informed design solution can be achieved.”55

With the help of the digital computer, different configurations of the terminal were studied and compared with regard to their respective ZVIs. [Fig. 5; Fig. 6] In the simulation, people’s views of the terminal were reconfigured as quantities of visual intrusion, which made it easy to rapidly compare different schemes. Once an acceptable layout had been agreed, techniques of camouflage were adopted to analyse how the terminal could be made to blend in with the landscape.

53 Cairns 1974, 30. 54 “Visual Analysis: A Computer-Aided Approach to Determine Visibility” Computer-Aided Design, Vol 9, Issue 2, April 1977: 103. 55 Aylward and Turnbull, “Visual Analysis: A Computer-Aided Approach to Determine Visibility” 1977: 103-108.

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“Blend-and-Blur” To define the properties that gave Flotta its unique character, which in turn would aid decisions on what colour treatment would best integrate the terminal with the landscape, extensive photographic analyses, field studies, and interviews were conducted. Woodland was found entirely missing in the landscape – traditionally one of the main space forming elements of landscape. While lacking in contrasting features, the team discovered that Flotta’s landscape was animated though the movement of clouds and other atmospheric effects. The play of light on the landscape was found to add significantly to “the drama of the landscape.”56 It was expected that the storage tanks would been seen against a backdrop of low rolling topography barren of trees and covered in various heathers, grasses and low shrubs changing colour with the seasons and with atmospheric light conditions. To select a colour treatment for the terminal in these shifting conditions, the team decided to use a method developed by Alexander Hardy, a building scientist at the University of Newcastle-upon-Tyne.

Hardy was an architect who in the 1960s had worked in the War Office where he experimented with theories of visual perception and colour. It was here that he confronted the practical methods of terrain analysis and colour masking that he later introduced to the civil design and planning community. When integrating a structure into a landscape, Hardy argued, the chroma (greyness) of the structure’s colour is more important than the selected hue.57 His theory hinged the texture-gradient theory of space perception and drew in part on the work of American psychologist James Gibson.58 A central concept in military camouflage, the texture-gradient theory states that most fields of vision are textured in some way so that the vertical plane appears as a texture of uniform scale while the horizontal plane presents an image of a texture diminishing in scale with distance from the observer. When viewing a grass field, for example, blades of grass are visible close to the observer while further away the grass appears as a two- dimensional patterned surface. Still further away, it appears to be a surface of uniform colour but

56 Cairns 1974, 1. 57 Alexander C. Hardy. 1967. Colour in Architecture (London: L. Hill). 58 The Perception of the Visual World (1950).

15 diminishing in value and Chroma with distance.59 After leaving the War Office Hardy applied this colour theory in studies of farm buildings and touring caravans.60 Now the language was modified for a new audience: the muted colours were likened to those of Biba's clothes, rather than military camouflage.61 In accordance with Hardy’s theory, the Flotta design team set out to find a suitable colour by simulating the appearance of the terminal from, what were decided to be, the most important locations from the terminal it would be viewed. The storage tanks would be seen in a nearly flat landscape of heather, grass and low shrubs, which was found to change significantly in colour with the seasons and shifting atmospheric conditions. Two alternative approaches to colour treatment were explored. The first, which the landscape architects called “image making,”62 entailed using bold primary colours to create a sense of place and location in monotonous landscapes. Here, dashes of bright colour were intended to provide stimuli for visual excitement. The design team recognized that, while the technique had been successful in urban industrial settings, it would most likely not be accepted in the seemingly undisturbed landscape of Flotta. However, a bright white colour was chosen for some of the smaller buildings. Known as the concept of “isolation”63 - a common technique of deception in military camouflage - the brightness was introduced to draw the attention of an observer to the least important part of a scene.

For the major parts of the terminal, a more muted effect was desired, not to make the terminal invisible but to visually break up the solid mass of the tanks. Eleven colours from the British Standard 4800 range were selected for testing, and six representative landscapes around the terminal were chosen and photographed. On each photograph, a rectangular strip of each colour was superimposed. Each of the six sets of eleven colours were then compared, by four trained observers in two groups, using a scoring system. Once the eleven colours had been narrowed down to two, onsite tests were conducted. Now, large panels of solid colours were erected in the landscape on the proposed site of the tanks.64 [Fig. 7] The coloured panels were examined

59 Hardy, Alex. “Landscape and Human Perception,” in Alan C. Murray (Ed). Methods of Landscape Analysis: Proceedings of Symposium, London, 3 May 1967. (London: Landscape Research Group): 3-8. 60 Hardy. 1967. Colour in Architecture. 61 Hardy, “Caravan Colours” Design Journal 1966. 62 Cairns 1974: 43-44. 63 Cairns 1974, 44. 64 Occidental, The Flotta Story, 1977.

16 relative to vegetation cover, light quality, and weather under as many prevailing weather conditions as possible. In addition, the panels were photographed where after the pictures were evaluated using the same scoring system as before. Finally, a single colour for each tank was selected.

In 1974, only two years after construction had begun, the first oil arrived through the pipes on Flotta, and in 1977 Occidental’s Armand Hammer and Energy Minister Tony Benn MP officially inaugurated the oil handling terminal. It was expected to operate for about 15 years and had cost 650 million pounds to build. [Fig. 8] The reinstatement of the landscape around the terminal was completed in 1978. The six final Environmental Impact Statements identified 500 impacts, ranging from disturbances to seal movements to air pollution and noise. It was widely agreed that with its low tank profiles and muted colours, the terminal was well integrated in the landscape. William Cairns noted: “With regard to specific techniques to reduce the impact of large-scale industrial development in rural areas, a policy of ‘blend and blur’, encouraging the loss of man- made forms, was recognized to be the most sensitive policy, and has been that followed at Flotta.65 In another place, Occidental reported that “it should be noted”, however, “that this visual integration was not achieved without cost.”66 In 2017, the terminal celebrated 40 years in operation, today handling on average 100,000 barrels per day. It is currently the workplace of 280 people and has exported more than 2.6 billion barrels of crude oil, compared to the 642 million barrels estimated in 1972. Right next to the oil terminal, a 64-meter wind turbine, claimed to be one of the most productive in the world, was constructed in 2010.67

Conclusions One objective of the Flotta project was the terminal’s visual integration with the landscape. As important, arguably, was the integration of industrial projects of this socio-political complexity into the UK’s development control process. One tool for doing that is the EIA and VIA procedures, and for both of these the Flotta project set an early example. Needless to say, whether one likes it or not, the oil handling terminal constitutes a major intrusion in the visual environment of Flotta and Scapa Flow. Thus, coming back to provocative title of this article,

65 Cairns 1978, 133. 66 Occidental, The Flotta Story, 1977, 15. 67 "Flotta Wind Power." Flotta Wind Power. Accessed June 13, 2018. http://www.flottawindpower.co.uk/.

17 “How to Hide a 395-Acre Oil Terminal”, my intention has been to demonstrate that the architects’ computer-based visual analysis methods were, in fact, not the primary tools used to justify the terminal’s construction. A more effective tool to integrate a large industrial facility amidst a scenic rural area is legislation, that is, to invent new planning procedures with power to justify a controversial development of this kind. What is at stake in this process is that complex political questions are assimilated into technical processes resulting in what Mark van Norman calls a “professional theft of evaluation.”68 My interpretation of the development on Flotta is not that complex public planning debates were short-circuited by resorting to a digital, repeatable procedure that compute “human” seeing behaviours. Rather, I suggest that in the Flotta project we can observe how monetary transactions from Occidental to the Council and local community constitute the cornerstone in making the development happen without a public inquiry, whereas the EIA and VIA appear to have served as its official justification. As the number of seals far outnumbered the people living on Flotta at the time, “virtual witnessing”69 of the estimated impacts could proceed without objection.

68 1975. 69 Steven Shapin and Simon Schaffer. Leviathan and the Air Pump. (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1985).

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References Addison, Christopher. 1931. Report of the National Park Committee. London: Her Majesty’s Stationary Office. Alberti, Leon Battista. 1955. Ten Books on Architecture. London: A. Tiranti. Aylward, Graeme, and Mark Turnbull. 1982. “Visual Impact Analysis” in Alan Pipes (Ed.) CAD82: 5th International Conference and Exhibition on Computers in Design Engineering. Guildford: Butterworth & Co. Ltd.: 228-238. -----. 1977. Visual Analysis: A Computer-Aided Approach to Determine Visibility. Computer- Aided Design, Vol 9, Issue 2, April 1977: 103-108. Built Environment 1978. Special issue on Environmental Impact Analysis, Vol 4, No 2: 85-160. Cairns, William J. 1978. The Flotta EIA Study. Built Environment 4: 129-133. Cairns, William J., and Peter M. Rogers. (Eds.) 1981. Onshore Impacts of Offshore Oil. (London, Applied Science Publishers Ltd.). Cairns, William J., Occidental of Britain Inc. 1973. Flotta Orkney Oil Handling Terminal: Report 1 An Environmental Assessment. Unpublished report to Occidental of Britain Inc. and associated companies. Cairns and Associates, December 1973. Cairns, William J., Occidental of Britain Inc. 1974. Flotta Orkney Oil Handling Terminal: Report 2 Visual Impact Appraisal and Landscape Proposals. Unpublished report to Occidental of Britain Inc. and associated companies. Cairns and Associates, June 1974. Catlow, J. and Thirlwall, C.G. 1976.Environmental Impact Analysis, Research report No. 11, Department of the Environment, London. Clark, B.D., Chapman, K., Bisset, R. and Wathern, P. 1976. Assessment of Major Industrial Applications, A Manual. Research report 13, Department of the Environment, London. Clark, B.D.; Chapman, K.; Bisset, R; and Wathern, P. 1981. Assessment of Major Developments: A ManuaI. Her Majesty's Stationery Office, London. Committee on the Environment Report to the Oil Development Council for Scotland. 1974. North Sea Oil and the Environment. Edinburgh: Her Majesty’s Stationary Office. Daston, Lorraine and peter Galison. 2007. Objectivity. New York: Zone Books. -----.1992. The Image of Objectivity. Representations. No. 40, Special Issue: Seeing Science (Autumn, 1992): 81-128.

19 Dower, John, Ministry of Town and Country Planning. 1945. National Parks in England and Wales: A Report by John Dower. Cmd. 6628. London: Her Majesty’s Stationary Office. European Union. 1985. Council Directive 85/337/EEC on the Assessment of the Effects of Certain Public and Private Projects on the Environment. Letter from K. G. Evans (Min. of Defence, Naval Construction Research Establishment) to Captain D. J. Bent (Queen’s Harbour Master). 22 May, 1974. POWE 63/1175. National Archives Kew, London. Halford, Timothy W. Interview by Hugo Manson. Part of Lives in the Oil Industry. November 22, 2000, in London, UK. Cassette tape. University of Aberdeen/British Library, London. Hardy, Alexander C. 1967. Colour in Architecture. London: L. Hill. -----.1966. Caravan Colours. Design Journal. Hobhouse, Arthur L. 1947. Hobhouse Report on National Parks (Cmd. 7121) London: Her Majesty’s Stationary Office. Gibson, James. 1950. The Perception of the Visual World. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company. Goodman, Nelson. 1978. Ways of Worldmaking. New York: Hackett Publishing. Hall, Peter. Environmental Impact Analysis—Scientific Tool or Philosopher's Stone? Built Environment 4: 84-86.) Jasanoff, Sheila, Gerald E. Markle, James C. Petersen, and Trevor Pinch (Eds.) 1995. Handbook of Science and Technology Studies. Newbury Park, CA: Sage. Jasanoff, Sheila. Acceptable Evidence in a Pluralistic Society. In Deborah G. Mayo and Rachelle D. Hollander (Eds.) Acceptable Evidence: Science and Values in Risk Management. New York/Oxford: Oxford University Press: 29-47. Jones-Imhotep, Edward. 2017. The Unreliable Nation: Hostile Nature and Technological Failure in the Cold War. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Landscape Institute, I.E.M.A. (2013). Guidelines for Landscape and Visual Impact Assessment. GLIVA3, 3rd edition. London: Routledge. Ministry of Power. Scapa Flow: Development of an Oil Terminal. 1974 Jan 01 - 1976 Dec 31. POWE 63/1175. National Archives Kew, London. Murray, Alan C. (Ed). Methods of Landscape Analysis. Proceedings of Symposium, London, 3 May 1967. London: Landscape Research Group. van Norman, Mark. 1975. The Professional Theft of Evaluation. DMG-DRS Journal 9: 57-66.

20 Occidental North Sea Consortium. 1977. The Flotta Story: The Development of an Oil Handling Terminal. London: Occidental North Sea Consortium. -----.1982. Flotta Oil Handling Terminal Orkney, Civic trust Premier Award Winner 1982. O'Riordan, Timothy. 1989. EIA in Britain. EIA Review Vol 2, No 1:89-102. -----. “Beware binding commitments: The British approach to EIA” Environmental Impact Assessment Review Volume 2, Issue 1, March 1981: 89-102. Shapin, S. and Schaffer, S. 1985. Leviathan and the Air Pump. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. Sheail, John. 2002. An Environmental History of Twentieth-Century Britain. New York: Palgrave. Sinclair, David Francis. Interview by Hugo Manson. Part of Lives in the Oil Industry. Monday 3 November 2003, in Flotta, Scotland. Cassette tape. University of Aberdeen/British Library, London. Sphere Consultants 1976. An Environmental Appraisal of the Sullum Voe Terminal. London. Sullom Voe Environmental Advisory Group. 1976. Oil terminal at Sullom Voe: Environmental Impact Assessment. Sandwick, Shetland: Thuleprint Ltd. . 1949. National Parks and Access to Countryside Act, 1949, 14 Geo. 6, c. 97. https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/Geo6/12-13-14/97

21 Figures

Figure 1 Figure 2 ‘Golta Peninsula from the air.’ Occidental Petroleum 1977, 10. Cairns and Associates, June 1974.

Figure 3 News clippings from 1973. David Sinclair 2011.

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Figure 4 Top: Artist’s impression of the terminal from the air. Below: Existing conditions of the terminal site.’ Cairns and Associates, June 1974.

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Figure 5 Figure 6 View analysis of final scheme plus landforms. “Visual analysis: a computer-aided approach to determine Cairns and Associates, June 1974. visibility” Turnbull and Aylward, 1977.

Figure 7 Figure 8 Onsite colour studies. The Flotta oil handling terminal in 1985. Occidental, The Flotta Story, 1977. Occidental 1985, 10.

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