5 Planning Risks Decoding The NPPF
Reading the National Planning Policy Framework can be dry and tough to digest, however the insights learned from there uncovers core initiatives and criteria laid out for councils to create their local plans for their specific area. Here at Volume Metric we have decoded the NPPF to understand the core planning principles guiding local councils decisions so you don’t have to.
Understanding the principles behind the decisions is a crucial step to creating the best chance of receiving planning approvals by working within these frameworks. Fully digesting this document serves as the best possible tool to de-risking property development in the UK.
Biodiversity and Geodiversity.
These two hand in hand, biodiversity meaning the facilitation of diversity for living organisms in that area and similarly geodiversity for non-living organisms like rocks, fossils and soils.
Biodiversity Net Gain
Biodiversity and geodiversity in a nutshell provides habitats and contribute towards the natural countryside beauty that the UK is renowned for, and must be protected whilst allowing the sustainable development. This is where the biodiversity net gain comes.
The biodiversity net gain set out in the NPPF requires a 10% biodiversity uplift for each all proposed major development with 10+ dwelling or sites >0.5 hectares, and since 2 April 2024 this now includes small developments of 1-9 or commercial floorspace <1000m2.
Nutrient Neutrality
Unfortunately developments have been known to cause excess nitrogen and phosphorus into catchments or rivers nearby through surface water run off through a process called ‘eutrophication’. This basically causes a hypotoxic environment in rivers where algae forms and blocks sunlight to other life forms within the habitat.
This legislation is a little unclear on how developers are to prevent this from happening, so there is talk that this legislation will be revised, but for the time being we are to take mitigating measures.
Tree Preservation Orders
Trees and ancient woodland provide natural protection and habitat for many endangered species, and enhances the local area for many practical reasons. For example, trees are an effective mitigation measure against Flood Risk.
This means there is a legal requirement to obtain planning permission if you intend to build near or are in need of cutting down a tree with TPO. A solid case will need to be provided to convince the planning authority that removing the tree(s) is necessary.
2. Sustainability and Green Development
Sustainability is one of those words that have been bound about so frequently that it's easy to forget what it actually refers to. What are we sustaining, and what exactly makes something sustainable?
Cradle to Cradle
Cradle to cradle is the process of ensuring raw materials are not wasted, but instead their uses are completely utilized to get the most of all the different uses out of the scarce resources. For example trees provide a cradle to cradle material, as one tree can be made into many different materials, and then turned into fertilizer to help grow more trees, and the cycle continues. This is sustainable because we can keep this going forever if we ensure a 1 for 1 ratio of consumed trees to trees produced.
Recycle & Reuse
The recycling of materials is also important, namely for materials that are often wasted such as plastic and polycarbonates that unfortunately end up in our seas and rivers, toxifying our natural environment. It’s important we prioritise these materials first where possible, and also re-use existing materials on site where possible.
Vernacular
Vernacular building and carbon footprint often go hand in hand, as materials sourced nearby are usually the best method of reducing the amount of fossil fuels being burnt for transportation of goods. This is another reason why it’s so important that Britain gets back to manufacturing materials in the UK instead of outsourcing it to other countries.
These three benchmarks are valuable heuristics for understanding whether your development is sustainable or not. Showing all three of these in your planning application is vital to aligning with the framework outlined by the government and therefore allowing the planners to be in favour of your development.
Equality and Affordability
The opportunity for everyone to be able to have a roof over their head is such an important aim, and part of the goals outlined in NPPF. As property developers we have a unique opportunity to contribute to the reduction of the overall cost of housing, as when homes are more abundant, prices should become more affordable.
However the problem we have in Britain, is that the production of housing cannot keep up with the demand, not to mention inflation which heavily contributes to the rising cost of housing. However, NPPF does have requirements to help aid the affordability of housing.
Affordable Homes
Affordable housing, not to be confused with social housing; as affordable housing is a broader term outlined in the NPPF in order for councils to help people achieve up to 20% cheaper rent and low cost ownership known as shared-ownership.
For medium to large housing developments that are proposed to have 10 or more homes or sites over 0.5 hectares, at least 10% of the development must be allocated for affordable housing, and if the project is on the Green Belt then obligation for allocation goes up to 50% max. However smaller developments that are fewer than 10 homes generally are exempt from this, unless your project sits within a national park, then the threshold drops to 5 homes or fewer.
Affordable housing comes in the form of Social Rented housing, Starter Homes, and Shared Ownership which have varying levels of market discounts that are taken on by the developer, so little to no profit is to be made on affordable housing, which is something that can catch out new developers.
The Housing Delivery Test
This is the yearly result published by the Secretary of State to measure net home built in a local borough or council against how much they were expected to deliver. This is a key piece of information that property developers can use to understand which local authorities are failing their yearly housing supply.
This is a serious issue because with rising demand and ability for housing prices to keep up with inflation, the councils need to hit their targets in order to give their contribution to the affordability of homes. As property developers we can use this as leverage along with the local plan to build a planning proposal for your development.
Conservation and Special Sites
Maintenance and conservation are important aspects of how the UK government manages the assets that great developers and nature have formed previously, and for good reason. There is something so beautiful about going into town and seeing historic buildings and beautifully green natural landscapes. It fosters an attraction for tourists and locals to get out and contribute to our economy, and preserves capture the rich history of the nation.
SSSI and Conservation Area
Sites of Special Scientific Interest are specific conservation zones that are set up to protect geological and ecological areas of the UK as it may be of interest to scientific study.
Listed Building and Heritage
Some buildings are just too beautiful to tear down, and some buildings have certain historical interest relevant to the local area. However Listed buildings add another layer of complexity and risk to getting planning approval that can scare off many new developers.
However with the right strategy, sympathetic to the Listed Building and surrounding area it can sometimes be worth looking at as a development opportunity.
AONB and National Parks
An Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty is similar status to a Nation Park, and is very difficult to achieve planning on a development. We tend to stay away from this as it poses too much risk of refusal for our appetite.
Green Belt
A settlement boundary or built up residential area can usually be contained by where the local planning authority has allocated land to prevent urban sprawl or rapid expansion.
Trying to get planning on Green Belt allocated land can be tricky…but not impossible if you employ the right strategy, as there are opportunities within the Green Belt to develop land known as Grey Belt where hardstanding or perceived ugly (low quality) land is actually far game as developable with permission.
High Risk and Safety
Flood Risk
There are around three flood risk zones to pay attention to, and the understanding where your development can make the difference between a project being viable or virtually being dead in the water (to excuse the pun).
In short we would personally avoid flood zone 3 entirely, it just poses too much risk for refusal, however zone 2 and zone 1 will need significant investment in a flood risk strategy and strict adherence to planning conditions to ensure that flood risk safety conditions are discharged.
Radon Gas
An invisible, odorless radioactive gas seeping into a house that is linked to lung cancer does not sound good at all. Unfortunately there is no known safe level for this so ideally we would want to find a site with as low chance of radon gas as possible, and even threshold is below 100-200 Bq/m³ (Becquerels per cubic metre), mitigation will still need to be accounted for in appraisals.
However design solutions such as suspended ground floor beam and block with telescopic vents and radon gas certified membranes will help ventilate and prevent gas entering the home.
Public Rights of Way
Understanding what legal rights within or on the boundary of the land you intend to develop is vital, as it can significantly impact your development or even make things very difficult to even get approvals.
Sometimes a public path way could go directly though your site where you intend to build, regardless of private ownership. In order to make a site like this viable, you will need to obtain permission for a diversion.
This is something that a lot of new developers get caught out on, and for us we tend to stay away from sites like this unless we feel we can obtain the necessary diversions to make the opportunity viable.
In conclusion…
After reading through the Nation Planning Policy Framework and regurgitating it back on this journal, we hope this has clarified for you some of the major risks when seeking property development opportunities.
Luckily we use Searchland, an online land sourcing tool that provides us up-to-date planning information to overlay these constraints very easily, and depending on the strategy we choose to go for when hunting for property, we are equipped with quality information to assess whether the risks will pose an issue to our proposed development.
In future journals we will outline more of the planning strategies outlined in the NPPF that are used by planners to create their local plans, as adding this information to this article would have made this journal entry even longer than necessary. So we hope that this has given you an idea of what risks are associated with property development in the UK currently.
We hope you found this journal entry informative, and we are constantly searching for new opportunities, so if you are interested in investing with us or working with us, please get in touch!
