Talk to Association of Local Environmental Record Centres Annual meeting 2015

1. Planning for Biodiversity:
Maximising the evidence
opportunity.
Alister Scott MRTPI

2. “It is a capital mistake to
theorise before you have data”
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle Scandal in Bohemia

3. Planning Challenge(s)
• Uncertainty
• Conflicting values
• Demographic change
• Economic growth
• Housing need
• Employment land
• Infrastructure
• Climate change
• Species decline
• Reduced diversity of
natural and built assets
• Political football
• Scapegoats

4. Biodiversity Challenge
• < 33% of Development Plans
have strategic approach to
planning for biodiversity.
• > 33% of Dev Plans have no
evidence of biodiversity being
a core determinant of spatial
strategy.
• NPPF’s polic(ies) for
biodiversity at a landscape
scale has not been widely
embedded in Dev Plans
(Natures voice, 2015)

5. Research
evidence
Policy
Delivery
Closing Evidence-
Policy - Delivery Gap
(adapted from Waters, 2012 )

6. Talk Outline
1. Exposing Built vs Natural
Environment Divide
2. Whose Biodiversity policy do
we want: NPPF vs NEWP vs ?
3. Seizing new opportunities
Ecosystem Science meets
Spatial Planning
4. Hooks and Case Studies
5. Discussion
6. Questions

7. Exposing the divide
Natural Environment lens
1. Incentives
2. Natural Environment White
Paper
3. Habitat and Landscape Scale
4. DEFRA
5. Ecosystem Approach
6. Classifying and Valuing
7. National Ecosystem Assessment
8. Catchment management Plans
9. Nature Improvement Areas
10. Local Nature Partnerships
Built Environment lens
1. Control
2. National Planning Policy
Framework
3. Local scale
4. DCLG
5. Spatial Planning
6. Zoning and Ordering
7. Cost Benefit Assessments
8. Development Plans
9. Enterprise Zones
10. Local Enterprise Partnerships

8. Whose biodiversity polic(ies)
do we want?
Department of Communities
and Local Government HM Government

9. In pursuit of integration:
Legal Duties
• NERC 2006 Act Section 40 to have
regard, in the exercise of their functions,
to the purpose of conserving biodiversity.
• NEWP 2011 White Paper
• Biodiversity 2020 2011

10. But Defra Biodiversity 2020
• better wildlife habitats – quality goals for
priority habitat/SSSIs
• more, bigger and less fragmented areas
for wildlife –
• restoration of 15% of degraded
ecosystems – climate change mitigation
and adaptation
• establishing a Marine Protected Area
network
• Marine plans in place by 2022
• improvement in status of our wildlife and
prevention of further human induced
extinctions of known threatened species
• significantly more people engaged in
biodiversity issues, aware of its value
and taking positive action

11. Integration 2 NPPF/NPPG
6 The purpose of the
planning system is to
contribute to the
achievement of sustainable
development. The policies
in paragraphs 18 to 219,
taken as a whole, constitute
the Government’s view of
what sustainable
development in England
means in practice for the
planning system.

12. But : NPPF
17 Every effort should
be made objectively to
identify and then meet
the housing, business
and other development
needs of an area, and
respond positively to
wider opportunities for
growth.
• Priority growth lanes

13. Although NPPF
• 109 The planning system
should contribute to and
enhance the natural and local
environment by:
– protecting and enhancing
valued landscapes, geological
conservation interests and soils;
– recognising the wider benefits
of ecosystem services;
– minimising impacts on
biodiversity and providing net
gains in biodiversity where
possible, …….. including by
establishing coherent
ecological networks

14. NPPG: Biodiversity
• Movable feast of policy
priorities and updates
• Regularly changed.
• Role of ecological networks
• Role of LNPs
• Proportionality of ecological
surveys
• Enhancement of
biodiversity
• Reduced role for GI
• Local planning authorities
….should seek
opportunities to work
collaboratively with other
partners, including Local
Nature Partnerships, to
develop and deliver a
strategic approach to
protecting and improving
the natural environment
based on local priorities and
evidence.
• Paragraph: 008 Reference
ID: 8-008-20140306

15. ALERC’s role
• A Local Record Centre can be an effective
mechanism for facilitating access to
environmental information which may be held
across many public and voluntary organisations.
Such centres provide a one-stop information
source, often serving a specific county or
grouping of local authorities. Their main
function is to collate, manage and disseminate
biodiversity information but they may also hold
other types of environmental data and can also
advise on evidence gathering.
• NPPG Paragraph: 010 Reference ID: 8-010-
20140306

16. The Value of Nature
• “In many cases nature
is ignored or trumped
by other economic or
social priorities, or seen
as a barrier to growth to
be overcome.
• Ecosystem services
and natural capital help
re-frame nature as an
asset to society that
delivers many benefits”.
• Scott 2014

17. The State of Nature (NEA
2011)

18. Ecosystem Science
Opportunity (NEAFO 2014)

19. Introducing the Ecosystem
Approach

21. Introducing Spatial Planning
• Working across
multiple scales and
sectors
• Evidence based
policy
• Plan led development
• Inclusive and
equitable
Eurocities 2004

22. Overcoming disintegration

23. Integrating NEAFO, NEWP
and NPPF

24. Built Environment Hooks
• Value Ecosystem Services
(p109/114ff)
– Green/Blue Infrastructure
– Ecological networks
– Biodiversity Impact Assessment
• Duty to Cooperate
– Payments for ecosystem
services
– LNP /LEP
• Viability
– Environmental limits
• Regulation
– Environmental protection
– Designation

25. Value Ecosystem Services
109 The planning system
should contribute to and
enhance the natural and
local environment by:
• recognising the wider
benefits of ecosystem
services;
109-125: ecological
networks; landscape scale;
green infrastructure

26. Value Ecosystem Services
109 The planning system
should contribute to and
enhance the natural and
local environment by:
• recognising the wider
benefits of ecosystem
services;

27. Baseline Mapping

28. Opportunity Mapping

29. Assessing Trade Offs

30. Location determined by
Market values only:
food
+ timber
(i.e. ignoring
externalities)
Optimal land use case study:
Where to plant Britain’s new forests
Cost benefit value:
- £66million p.a.
30
Source Bateman Church
and Fish 2014

31. Location determined by
Market values only:
food
+ timber
(i.e. ignoring
externalities)
Location determined by
Market + Non-Market
Values
food
+ timber
+ greenhouse gases
+ recreation
+ water quality improvement
+ biodiversity improvement
Optimal land use case study:
New forests
Cost benefit value:
- £66million p.a.
Cost benefit value:
+ £546million p.a.
31

32. Omitting non-market goods Including non-market
goods
32

33. Duty to Cooperate
“To engage constructively,
actively and on an ongoing
basis to maximise the effectiveness
of Local Plan preparation
in the context of strategic
cross boundary matters”.

34. Housing
• IDENTIFY Objectively
assessed housing need
• 5 year housing supply
• REVISE via constraints
or neighbours
BUT

35. Catchment
Management
Source: Jim Davies
Env Agency

36. Incentives: Payments for
Ecosystem Services

37. Birmingham

38. Green Living
Spaces Plan 2014
Spatial Layers
1.aesthetics and mobility
2.flood risk
3.local climate
4.education
5.recreation
6.biodiversity

39. 39

42. South Downs National
Park: Draft Policy
• The Authority will take a positive
approach to sustainable development
provided it does not cause irreversible
harm to the natural environment and its
ability to contribute natural goods and
services, where it is not possible to
mitigate for this impact. Proposals that
accord with other relevant policies will
be permitted where they:

43. a) Conserve and enhance natural beauty, wildlife
and cultural heritage.
b) Improve the National Park’s resilience to climate
change.
c) Sustainably manage land and water environments.
d) Conserve high quality soils.
e) Mitigate the risk of flooding.
f) Conserve high quality drinking water resources.
g) Reduce pollution.
h) Improve opportunities for peoples’ health and wellbeing.
i) Stimulate sustainable economic activity.
j) Provide more and better joined up ecological habitats.
k) Propose high quality sustainable design.
l) Increase ability to store carbon through new planting or
other means.

44. Monitoring (weak)
• Ecosystem service
baselines
• Indicators to
measure
progress

45. ALERC Evidence
• Capturing and
mapping data of key
ecosystem services
• Role of measuring
flows (demand and
supply) of ecosystem
services (benefits and
disbenefits)
• Policy interventions
assessment

46. Discussion
• Learning different
languages to achieve
your goals
• Ecosystem services
threat or opportunity ?
• Evidence based Policy vs
policy based evidence
• Meaningful partnerships
(LEPS + LNPs)?
• Rethink viability and duty
to cooperate

47. Duty to Cooperate
Biodiversity
• NEWP meets NPPF • Objective assessment
of biodiversity needs
• Link in with
environmental limits
• Plans must conform
with a 5 year no net
loss.

48. Completing the Jigsaw
Alternative
scenarios
Duty to
Cooperate
Monitoring
and
indicators
Valuation
EvidenceNEWP
NPPF
Ecosystem
Approach
Guidance
Public
Participation
Local Plan
Development
Joined up planning

49. Lets be NEATER
Alister.scott@bcu.ac.uk
@bcualisterscott