Modernising environmental regulation for British industry
Environmental permitting for industry and energy is to be modernised, following the Corry Review.
The Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs, the Environment Agency and MP Emma Hardy have announced Britain’s industrial and energy sectors are ‘set to benefit from a modernised environmental permitting regime – with greater flexibility, faster timelines and less red tape'.
The Corry Review outlines the drive for these changes and suggests that current environmental regulation can be risk-averse, inefficient, and difficult to navigate, holding back innovation and growth.
An eight-week consultation intends to reform permitting in the industrial and energy sectors and deliver a simplified framework fit for the future – with the aim of helping British industry ‘embrace tomorrow’s technologies more quickly, increasing competitiveness and creating economic growth’.
The plans could see what the combined departments say is a ‘more common-sense process for approving time-limited trials for cutting-edge new technologies, such as the use of hydrogen as fuel at industrial sites, to help accelerate the process of bringing them to market’.
The consultation also proposes that the Environment Agency could introduce a registration approach for low-risk installations, such as data centres and back-up generators. This is intended to cut permit waiting times – potentially from months to days – with the intention of lowering business costs.
In line with international best practice, flexible permits could be issued. The departments state this would set an overall cap on emissions at individual installations, rather than for separate processes at a facility, also aimed at cutting red tape.
Philip Duffy, chief executive at the Environment Agency, says, ‘Modernised regulation can help deliver growth, innovation and protect the environment and communities.
'Today’s consultation marks a positive step forward in efforts to make our regulatory regime fit for the future, with proportionate but robust rules that enable the UK to compete globally whilst supporting nature’s recovery.
'The Environment Agency will match this ambition with improvements in how we deliver the regime, with better IT, faster turnaround times and a commitment to support sustainable growth across the economy.
'Environmental permitting underpins the industrial and energy sectors through a world-leading approach to pollution control that protects communities and the environment.
'Industrial emissions have fallen significantly in the last 30 years, delivering more than £52 billion in benefits to human health, ecosystems and labour productivity.
However, the framework can and should work better in delivering the Government’s Plan for Change, net-zero ambitions, and environmental and health improvements.’
