A town planner working as account director for Environment Bank, Lloyd Collins will be discussing everything BNG and how businesses can find the right balance between activity and protecting the environment.
We caught up with Lloyd about his talk at the Build North Expo below:
Q) What will you be discussing in your talk, and what can people expect to learn?
A) We will discuss options for meeting BNG planning requirements and take an in-depth look at off-site mitigation, including using drone footage to showcase a Habitat Bank just down the road from the event venue.
Q) What does Environment Bank bring to the construction industry, and SME housebuilders specifically?
A) We are the leading provider of off-site Biodiversity Units and provide developers with a ready supply of local high-integrity Units from our nationwide network of Habitat Banks.
Q) What’s your assessment of current BNG regulations, and do you think there is change needed in order to meet the governments lofty housing targets?
A) We are beginning to see the BNG market mature, and the sales of our Biodiversity Units are really gaining momentum among major and SME house builders. We are confident that we can meet the demand across most of the country, with a steady supply of units as more Habitat Banks become operational and added to the gains site registry. We also offer fractional units to make BNG delivery more cost-effective for smaller projects.
While some developers take advantage of exception loopholes, these initial challenges are resolving as local planning authorities become better informed about BNG requirements.
Fundamentally, BNG is working, and as it intended, delivering thousands of acres for natural recovery every year – a key mechanism in stitching back our fragile ecosystems and meeting the government’s nature recovery targets.
Q) What are some of the advantages of off-site BNG, rather than on site?
A) In many cases, placing biodiversity gains off-site frees up development space for housing and other human-centric activities, making off-site mitigation often more cost-effective in the round. Additionally, habitats need to meet a target condition and be managed and reported on for 30 years, which can be challenging in residential areas. However, with off-site mitigation, this liability is passed onto the Habitat Bank provider through a legal agreement.
Furthermore, Environment Bank only takes on new sites when we can ensure high-quality habitat delivery. This also includes social and environmental factors, such as fair payments to landowners and farmers and designing sites to support specific local nature recovery strategies, such as flood mitigation or carbon sequestration.
