Choosing an industrial site across the EU and Oman

Delivery readiness is the first. This means whether the plot can be built on now: ground conditions, access, existing services to the boundary, and the sequence of approvals required before construction can start. A site that is zoned for industry but not serviced is a different proposition from one that is ready to build, and the difference is usually measured in years.

Power and water reliability is the second, and it is often decisive for process industries. It is not enough to establish that a connection is available. The relevant questions are the capacity available at the point of connection, the tariff structure including any demand or capacity charges, the historical reliability of supply, and the arrangements — and cost — of interruption. For continuous processes, the tolerance for interruption may be close to zero, which makes standby provision a capital item.

Logistics is the third. Inbound inputs and outbound product must move at a cost and reliability that the business case assumes. That means the actual routes, the actual transit times, the availability of the relevant transport modes and the cost of the full journey — not the proximity of a port on a map.

Permitting dependencies form the fourth. These are the approvals that must be obtained, their sequence, and which of them are on the critical path to operation. Environmental permitting, utility connection agreements and construction consents frequently interact, and a delay in one carries the others.

Workforce and climate exposure complete the picture. Workforce means availability of the specific skills required, at the relevant level, within commuting distance — and the training cost if they are not. Climate exposure means the physical risks to the specific site and process, which the European Environment Agency's 2024 climate risk assessment addresses across infrastructure, energy, water and related domains. [H]

Climate risk is frequently assessed as a general background consideration rather than as a site-specific input. The EEA's assessment identifies a substantial set of risks across infrastructure, energy, water, food, health and finance. [H] For site selection, the useful translation is specific: what does a given hazard do to this site, this process and this supply chain?

Heat affects cooling capacity, worker safety and the efficiency of some processes. Water scarcity affects processes that depend on water availability or on discharge consents. Flooding affects sites near watercourses or with inadequate drainage, and it affects inbound and outbound logistics even where the site itself is dry.

The practical output is not a score but a set of dependencies: the mitigation the site requires, the capital it implies, and the operating cost it adds. A site that requires substantial cooling provision or flood defence has a different cost base from one that does not, and that difference belongs in the comparison.

The single most useful discipline in cross-region site selection is a rule: no figure enters the comparison unless it is current, site-specific and traceable to a source that can be re-checked. Regional averages, published tariffs for a different consumer category, and estimates carried over from an earlier project all fail that test.

This rule is uncomfortable because it slows the process and because site-specific information is sometimes hard to obtain. The alternative is a comparison built on figures that cannot be defended when a board, a lender or a partner asks where they came from.

Where a figure genuinely cannot be obtained, the honest approach is to record it as an open item with an owner and a date, and to test the decision's sensitivity to it. A comparison with three named open items is more useful than one that conceals them inside an assumption.