Consultation on modernising environmental permitting for industry

At present, the R&D and testing exemption only applies to installations which are solely used for research, development or testing of new products and processes. We understand from industry that this approach has created perverse outcomes in some instances. For example, genuine R&D sites which have had to dispose of the valuable products of their pilot process, for example, hydrogen, as to sell these would have brought them into the scope of permitting.  

We would therefore like to explore changes to the definition of the R&D and testing exemption to clarify that genuine R&D sites can make commercial use of any products created without requiring an industrial emissions permit. Use of this exemption could benefit from light-touch monitoring to ensure that it does not provide a loophole through which commercial operations could avoid permitting. This could, for example, be achieved by requiring registration with the relevant regulator where an operator wishes to make commercial use of products created at an exempt R&D installation (see wider proposal on R&D registrations below).