Embracing the new EIA Regulations

Whilst climate change is already an important environmental, social and economic policy concern, the new EIA Regulations extend this consideration to project level assessment and decision-making. LUC has in-house competency in climate change and is already preparing climate change chapters for Environmental Statements (ESs) relating to both a sports stadium and an office led regeneration project.
Whilst historically, there has always been a strong link between land use planning and public health, the new EIA Regulations explicitly require consideration of ‘human health’. With this in mind, a number of LUC staff have recently completed an IEMA accredited course on ‘Health in EIA’. This is helping us to understand the links between the environment and health more fully and, in the current absence of formal guidance, to consider how we might develop a robust but proportionate approach to assessing this new topic.
To ensure a high level of protection for the environment, the new EIA Regulations also require consideration of the vulnerability of projects to major accidents and/or natural disasters, and any implications of this for the likelihood of the project having significant effects on the environment. Drawing on other relevant project documentation, as advised in the Directive, we are currently tackling our first ES chapter on ‘major accidents and disasters’, for a sports stadium.

Recent news