This page is text heavy - but if you want to know what is happening, it is worth a read! Infrastructure - transport access to other local roads and public transport networks, cycle ways, school provision, community facilities, allotments, playing fields, green space, sewage and water management all need to be included in a new development scheme. Planning permission will be granted if a development conforms to government planning and building regulations. Unfortunately planning regulations are out of date, not stringent with regard to energy requirements, and do not take into account all the modern technology now available.
The Shackles of the Planning Laws or Kicking the Can Down the Road – a Decade Wasted 2010-2020 Whilst declaring a Climate Emergency and aiming to be world leaders in sustainable building, the UK Government has disgracefully watered down its application of Nearly Net Zero Requirements for new buildings which were set out in detail in The Building Regulations 2010/2014 here and the treasury completely abandoned the proposals in 2015. 5. In this regulation:
a. “cogeneration” means simultaneous generation in one process of thermal energy and one or both of the following:- 1. electrical energy, 2. mechanical energy;
b. “district or block heating or cooling” means the distribution of thermal energy in the form of steam, hot water or chilled liquids, from a central source of production through a network of multiple buildings or sites, for the use of space or process heating or cooling;
c. “energy from renewable sources” means energy from renewable non-fossil sources, namely wind, solar, aerothermal, geothermal, hydrothermal and ocean energy, hydropower, biomass, landfill gas, sewage treatment plant gas and biogases;
d. “heat pump” means a machine, a device or installation that transfers heat from natural surroundings such as air, water or ground to buildings or industrial applications by reversing the natural flow of heat such that it flows from a lower to a higher temperature. (For reversible heat pumps, it may also move heat from the building to the natural surroundings.)
Since buckling under pressure from the developers and construction industry, the UK Government has disgracefully enabled the reliance on ‘market forces’ as the driver for action. The inspired vision and investment of individuals or isolated/groups of institutions*, rather than a national integrated strategy, are being relied upon to avert massive and irreversible Climate Change. Subsidies that were in place to encourage the take-up of solar are now so small that they are meaningless, and it has been left to the electricity companies to offer the SEG (Smart Export Guarantee) and many of them are unhappy to do so. (Current average 5.5p per kWh, against a sale price of average 16p per kWh.) The smart meter rollout has been delayed 5 years, which has given them the perfect excuse not to join the SEG plan. The effect of this is that home owners are paying too much for their power, and are responsible for 29% of UK carbon emissions. Whilst some larger local authorities eg Nottingham, have endeavoured to embrace and implement the actions required, this cowardly retreat has left smaller authorities like Stroud District Council with detailed commitment in their planning** but with no power to enforce.
*Unitary Authority: Bath and North East Somerset, Nottingham, Reading. Metropolitan Districts: Manchester Shire Division: Oxford City, Stroud District, University: Leeds, Business/Social Enterprise: Manchester **Link to Self building Housing Checklist