Consultation on modernising environmental permitting for industry

The EA and local authorities serve as the regulators responsible for implementing and overseeing permitting of our industry and energy sectors (and other sectors, such as waste). The EPRs set a framework for delivery of permitting, for example, setting out requirements on what permits should cover, requirements to set emission limits based on BAT, the approach to cost recovery, inspection and compliance requirements and many other areas. Within this framework, regulators have discretion as to how they implement the EPRs’ requirements. 

In order to deliver the government’s aims for the permitting regime, regulators should have sufficient personnel, resources, systems and skills to permit industry effectively, ensuring permit applications are assessed and actioned promptly and that they protect the environment and health. The legislative framework should ensure that regulators are able to recover costs in line with polluter pays principle, new approaches to permit delivery are developed for novel and complex sites, and interactions with other regimes are clear with a minimum of duplication or inconsistency. 

Industry has highlighted permitting timelines as a persistent issue, and one which is becoming more pressing given the pace of industrial transformation required to deliver net zero and a circular economy. Current timelines are a result of numerous factors – in certain cases they can be an unavoidable result of the challenges of permitting new sectors and pollutants, for example, the lack of basic scientific data a result of poor quality or incomplete applications which require significant back and forth with the regulator.  

However, it is also essential that regulators continue to develop risk-based and efficient approaches to permit delivery while ensuring essential environmental and health protections are in place.  

Defra and DESNZ have funded the EA to develop standards and guidance for new technologies including hydrogen and anaerobic digestion to help speed up permitting. The EA has made use of standard rules permits, including for low-impact installations and for R&D, to ensure the permitting process is proportionate to the impacts from lower-risk activities. Previous chapters in this consultation have set out other reforms which will provide more tools for risk-based permitting, for example, ‘flexible tiers of regulation’ in Chapter 3.  

The EA is also rolling out a permitting transformation programme designed to modernise the permitting service. The Accelerated Permitting Transformation Programme aims to innovate and implement digital, regulatory, and business reforms to improve how the EA provide permissions, making them a more effective, anticipatory, and adaptable regulator while remaining a trusted decision-maker. Specific initiatives will include a streamlined validation process to speed up determination times and provide clarity to applicants; a new priority tracked service for complex multi-permit and NSIP sites in support of construction and major developments; and a new digital ‘apply and manage’ service, providing an all-inclusive, easy, seamless, and accessible digital platform.   

For local authority regulators, the Local Authority Unit (LAU) in the EA provides support by developing guidance and assisting local authorities on complex permit applications.  

Separate to these operational matters, this consultation provides an opportunity to consider reforms to the legislative framework for permitting delivery, including in relation to cost recovery, new models of permitting delivery and interactions with other regimes.